
Class 

Book 



S. 



I Abe* 







THE LIFE 



DANIEL WEBSTER, 

INCLUDING A BRIEF OUTLINE OF 

HIS SERVICES TO THE NATION, 

AS 

jUprrsmtauae, Imntar, aitfr Jwrrtitnj of $tafe. 




" TA< Union, Now and For tver, One and Imeparable '." 

WITH A SUMMARY OF HIS VIEWS ON THE 

GREAT NATIONAL QUESTIONS OF THE DAY. 

From tlus New York Daily Times of Oct. 25, 1852. 



NEW YORK : 
DE WITT k DAVENPORT, PUBLISHERS, 



R. CRAtOIIEAD, PRINTER, 

53 Vuty Strttl, .V. Y. 



The Publishers have been induced to reprint this Sketch of the 
Life and Public Career of Mr. Webster, from the New York Da;ly 
Times, in which it appeared the day after his death, by the belief that 
a clear and condensed summary of the events in which he has borne 
so conspicuous a part, will be popular and useful. The Editor of the 
Times, to whom they are indebted for permission thus to reprint it, 
desires them to 6ay, that ^an excuse should be found for its faults, in 
the fact that it was prepared, written, and put in type during the few 
hours that intervened between the receipt of intelligence that he was 
dying, and the hour on which the Daily Times of the 25th, was put to 
press. 



AMERICAN BIOGRAPHICAL LIBRARY. 



LIFE OF DANIEL WEBSTER. 



Daniel Webster was born in the 
town of Salisbury, New Hampshire, on 
the 18th January, 1782. His age, at 
the period of his death, was according- 
ly seventy years, nine months', and six 
days. 

The ancestral line of the "Webster 
family extended back, in authentic 
records, to the early part of the seven- 
teenth century. Thomas Webster, born 
in 1632, was the great-great-grand- 
father of Daniel. He emigrated to this 
country from Norfolk, England, in the 
year 1656, and settled at Hampton, 
in New Hampshire, where, soon after 
his arrival, he was united in marriage to' 
Sarah Brewer, by whom he had five 
sons and three daughters. Ebenezer, his 
second son, was born in 1667, and was 
married to Hannah Judkins in July, 
1709. Of his sons, only one had issue. 
This was Ebenezer, grandfather of 
Daniel, who was married to Susannah 
BatcheldeT in 1738, and had eight chil- 
dren, of whom the oldest was Ebenezer, 
the father of the Great Statesman. 

Ebenezer Webster was born in Kings- 
ton, New Hampshire, on the 22d of 
April, 1739. The settlement was then 
new, and Ebenezer's father was a dili- 
gent and persevering farmer. The son, 
an active youth, was early chosen as one. 
of the famous "Rangers" of Major 
Robert Rodgers, and served with that 
distinguished officer, under Lord Am- 
herst, in the French War of 1763. 
The Rangers were kept in the pay of the 
Crown 'luring the continuance of the 
War. Mr. Webster was one of the 



party which, under the command of 
Major Rodgers, made an expedition to 
Crown Point for the purpose of chastis- 
ing the Indians and destroying their vil- 
lages — an act which was deemed essen- 
tial to the preservation of the whites. 
The Rangers were always on active du- 
ty, and proved most efficient allies. 
The history of their trials and their tri- 
umphs has never been fully told . At the 
conclusion of the Peace, Mr. Webster, tak- 
ing advantage of the moment of quiet 
which was afforded him, commenced a 
settlement, in company with several 
others, in a border-town on a branch of 
the Merrimack River. The plate was 
first known as Bakerstowrf, but was af- 
terwards called Salisbury — a name that 
will endure as long as the history of its 
greatest Son shall be remembered and 
cherished among the proudest orna- 
ments of the country. Mr. Webster 
had just commenced the necessary pre- 
parations for a comfortable rural resi- 
dence, when the Revolutionary struggle 
began. His former reputation as one 
of the body of Rangers served to direct 
the eyes of his neighbors towards him, 
and his services were soon in active re- 
quest as the leader in the constitution of 
th»-ir military bands. It is needless to 
say that the veteran Ranger entered, 
heart and soul, into that long and 
dubious contest. Foremost among the 
brave defenders of the Nation, and skil- 
ful, brave, and experienced, the weight 
of Mr. Wei as speedily 

manifested in the consistenfardor with 
which the battle was maintained. 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



Mr. Webster commanded a volunteer 
company of his friends and neighbors 
under Genera] Stark, in the fight at 
Bennington, and during the engage- 
ment was seen in the thickest of the 
fray. It had been given out by Stark, 
some time previous to the battle, that it 
was bis intention to march to Stillwat'-r. 
and a detachment of the British, one thou- 
sand strong, was consequently sent to in- 
tercept him. The forces of the enemy 
having been thus divided and weakened, 
the American general was enabled to 
cope with them in detail. Col. Warner 
was Btationed in the rear of the Ameri- 
can army, with a reserved corps, while 
Captain Webster was ordered to advance 
with his company of one hundred men, 
in search of two hundred more, who 
were out upon a scout. The companies 
once united, Captain Webster was to 
assume the command of the whole, and 
fall upon the enemy on the rear, but on 
no account to fire, until the action had 
commenced on the other side. It was 
on this memorable occasion that Genera] 
Stark uttered the celebrated words: 
"Fellow-soldiers! there is the enemy: 
if we don't take them, Molly Stark will 
be a widow to-nighl !'' Captain Web- 
ster having fulfilled the duty assigned to 
him in collecting together the three 
hundred men, awaited his share in the 
honors of the day. When allowed to 
make his charge upon the enemy, with 
pieces loaded, and with firm and 
equal Btep, his men advanced upon the 
opposing breastworks. Captain Web- 
ster was the first t<> leap the defences, 
but the reinforcements were nol sufficient 
to render the attack successful, and his 
command was driven back. Meantime 
the l'>riti>h were strengthened by the 

arrival of on.- thousand fresh troops 
upon the field, and a new disposition 
of the battle became nec< ssary. Gene- 
ral Stark placed Captain Webster and 
Captain Gregg on the left wing of the 
American force, Colonel Nichols on the 
right, and ] army in a Btrong 

ion. 'I'll.- result of that struggle IS 
a matter of history, and a large propor- 
tion of its fain.' i- due to t li • • effbrl 



Ebenezer Webster. At the battle of 
White Plains, Mr. Webster was also 
present, and performed effective sen 
At the end of the war, he again retired 
to private life, and sought to end his 
days peacefully and with honor as an 
humble cultivator of the soil. This, 
however, was denied him. The people 
whom he had served had stronger claims 
upon him. He was, for several years, 
elected a Representative from Salisbury 
to the Legislature of New-Hampshire, 
and' in the years 1785-6-8 and '90 
tilled the office of State Senator. In 
1785 he was appointed Colonel of the 
Militia. In 1791 he was chosen as 
Judge of the Court of Common Pleas, 
for the County of Hillsborough, which 
office he held until 1805. On the 22d 
of April of the following year ,(1806) 
Col. Webster died upon his farm, at the 
j age of 67. His wife, Abigail, sun 
him ten years, and died on the 14th of 
April, 1816, aged 70 years. 

Col. Webster was twice married. 
\\\< second wife, Abigail Eastman, the 
mother of Daniel and Ezekiel, w 
lady of Wel-di descent, and a resident 

■ 

of Salisbury at the time of her marriage. 
I"- Daniel Webster was born under the 
influence of true New-England institu- 
tions. A harsh and rugged country, 
cold blasts and meagre natural advan- 
tages, formed no pleasant introductions 
to the world. The hills and forests of 
the Granite State offered few induce- 
ments, years ago, for the development 
of intellectual versatility and strength. 

It was the aim of her people to impart 
to their children the soundest principles 

of morality and common - Few 

indulgences were allowed them, and the 

SacredneSS <•( the parental control was 

strictly guarded. In the midst of such 
a public sentiment was Daniel Wei 
reared. He enjoyed \\ hat i- term' 
frood New England education, receiving 

the fullest advai I 

tern of that day — not. a- now, brought 
home to every door, hut occasional and 
migratory in its nature. 

While still young. Daniel was daily 
sent two miles and a half to school, in 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



the middle of winter, and on foot. lie 

walked the entire distance there and 
back. If the school chanced to remove 
still further from his father's house, 
board was engaged in some convenient 
family for the youthful student, and his 
acquisitions of knowledge were pursued 
without interruption. An ardent desire 
for learning was early manifest in the 
mind of Daniel Webster. Difficulties 
were presented, with which he was 
compelled to struggle ; hindrances stood 
in the way, which he was obliged to 
overcome. But every obstacle was sur- 
mounted, and the scholar came forth a 
man. His father was deeply impressed 
with the necessity of education, and 
spared no pains to give Daniel a 
thorough insight into the mysteries of 
knowledge. Among the few volumes con- 
tained in the Circulating Library of that 
day, the young Daniel found a special fasci- 
nation in a copy of the " Spectator" — 
particularly in the criticisms upon 
" Chevy Chase." Before he was four- 
teen years old, he could repeat the whole 
of the "Essay on Man." The muse 
possessed great attractions for his fancy, 
and devotional hymns were frequently 
added to the list of his juvenile accom- 
plishments. Among the pieces committed 
to memory, as a pastime merely, was 
the entire volume of that ancient collec- 
tion of church melodies known as 
" Watts's Psalms and Hymns." 

In his fourteenth year, Daniel was 
placed in Phillips' Academy at Exeter, 
~N. H., at that time under the care of 
Dr: Benjamin Abbot. This event, his 
first separation from home and friends 
took place on the 25th April, 1*796. 
Daniel was now one among ninety boys, 
all of whom were perfect strangers. 
Reconciling himself, however, to the 
necessities of the case, Daniel soon be- 
came naturalized among his new asso- 
ciates, and made rapid progress in the 
customary routine of academical studies. 
Public declamation, curiously enough, 
was his aversion, and the thought of it 
a bugbear. The future orator withdrew 
from observation, and sought to conceal 
himself behind his fellows. Remaining 



but a tew months at the academy, 

Daniel, in February, 1 7 '. » 7 , was pi 

under the tuition of Ibv. Samuel Woods, 
at Boacawen. The prospect of a col- 
legiate education was at this time first 
opened to him by his father. Incited 
by the indications of this preferment, 
Colleges being then exclusive, and not in 
every case attainable, the young man 
profited by the opportunities that were 
offered him. With Mr. Woods he read 
Virgil and Cicero, and became a fair 
Latin scholar. His favorite classic at 
this time was Cicero, and the strength 
of early impressions was never abated — 
the immortal Orator was always the 
favorite study of the American Sage. 

In the summer of 17'jT, Daniel entered j^ 
Dartmouth College as a Freshman. The 
regular duties of a student were per- 
formed by him with faithfulness and 
energy. He lost no time in idle dissi- 
pation, became noted for a constant avi- 
dity for reading, and devoted much at- 
tention to the acquisition of a knowledge^^* 
of English literature. Among his <mV 
lege pastimes he superintended the pub- 
lication of a small weekly newspaper, to 
which he contributed various selecti 
and occasionally an original essay. Th 
early efforts in composition are probably 
the first of his writings that were ever 
published. Graduating with the appro- 
bation of his fellows, and in receipt of 
the honorable testimonials of merit, 
though not displaying any remarkable 
powers which would seem to indii 
his future greatness, Daniel returned 
home, determined to adopt the pi 
sion of the law for a livelihood. 

A course of legal reading was begun 
under the eye of Mr. Thompson, a gen- 
tleman well" known to the family of Mr. 

ter, and afterwards Unit.- 5 
Senator. 1 >aniel's studio W0K not, I 
ever, suffered to be prolonged without „__ 
interruption. Anxious that hi- brother 
E/.ekiel should } advanl.lL-'> for 

education similar to those enjoyed by 
himself, Daniel ii I wkb hi-f;r 

with such success that tli-- brother, hi 
1801, was .sent t 1" meat tin 

additional expenses which this enema 




Life of Daniel Webster. 






stance involved, Daniel temporarily for- Boston, whore bis course of law-reading 
sook the Lav and commenced teachinglwent forward under the eye of the Hon. 
school, as much to advance his brother |GhristopheT Gore, afterwards Governor 

as to cover the necessary expenditures. ^^Massachusetts. The most ample op- 



y expend 

in the prosecution of his own profes- 
sion. The pedagogue was first made 
manifest in the town of Fryeburg, in 
Maine, where Daniel taught the town 
Academy, at the meagre stipend of 
$350. Of this amount, he contrived to 
save the whole, having obtained tin- 
post of Assistant to the Register of 
1 '• • ds of the County, by which he met 
the ordinary outlays of his position. In 
Fryeburg, Mr. Webster found another 
Circulating Library, in which was con- 
tained a set <>f Llackstone's Commen- 
taries, the legal food of the young stu- 
dent during his stay in that place. 
T^ In September, 1802, Daniel returned 
to Salisbury, and resumed the study of 
e Law with Mr. Thompson. When 
not so engaged, his time was occupied 
with the Latin Classics. lie read with 
avidity the tomes of Sallust, Caesar, and 

Horace. Bonn les of the latter were 

translated by him and* published. The 
sports of angling, gunning, and horse- 
manship, constituted his pastimes. Tht 
meditative pursuit of old Isaak was 
always a favorite amusement with th( 
Great Statesman, "With fishing-rod anc 



pie op- 
portunities were here enjoyed for a com- 
plete legal education, and Daniel so far 
improved them that in the following 
year (March, 1805,) he was admitted to 
practice in the Suffolk Court of Com- 
mon Pleas. According to the custom 
of those days, the pupil was accom- 
panied into Court by his patron. To 
the kind exertions o( Gov. Gore in his 
behalf, on this occasion, Mr. Webster 
acknowledged his great indebtedness. 
The introduction insured him respect 
and attention, and he was not long in 
stepping into a lucrative professional 
business. It is worthy of remark, as an 
evidence of the superior discernment of 
his legal guardian, that, in the intro- 
ductory address. Gov. Gore took the 
pains to utter a prophecy of the future 
celebrity of the young aspirant. Mr. 
ster began practice in the village 
of Boscawen. whence he removed to 
Portsmouth, N. II.. in ISoT. 
V. About this time, an event occurred 
which was nearly a crisis in the young 
man's history. The clerkship of the 
County Court of Common Pleas in 
Hillsborough, New Hampshire, became 



some tranquil stream, watching the play 
of the suspicious tribe, and moralizing, 
like his piscatorian model, upon the 
ways and doings of fishes and of men. 
Indeed, it is sportively said by his 
friends, that, as the future Orator one 
day drew in a large and most tempting 
tr<>ut. be uttered the words which he 
afterwards employed in the Bunker- 
Hill address: "venerable men! you 
have conic down to us from a former 
generation. Heaven has bounteously 

lengthened out your lives that you 

mighl behold this joyous day." The 
is probably a jest ; but the words 



line he would wait for hours besidAxacant, and Judge Webster being at the 



time upon the bench, his eolle.._ 

tendered the vacant poet to Daniel, 
mark of respect to his father. Daniel 
was not at all in favor of the pro] 

ti- 'ii. His friend, Gov. Gore, strongly 

discouraged his acceptance of the i 

■•• a clerk, a! way- a clerk." was the 
argument of that gentleman. Daniel, 
. -aw re.-isons why he should not 
accept. But ho knew his father's heart 
\\a> bent upon it, and, fearing to'refuse, 
tarted homeward. In ition 

with his father, he finally expressed his 
determination to decline. Judge Web- 
ster was for a moment incensed. Daniel 



are immortal, in this way, Mr. Web- replied that u he meant to use his tongue 

iter was ever in the hal.it of planning in the courts, not the pen; to be an 

•speeches and pursuing some other avo- actor, cot the register o\ other men's 



cation at one and the same moment. 



actions." His father answered him with 



In July, 1804, Daniel removed to pride. "His mother," he observed, "had 



L'i/i of Daniel Webster. 



/ 



always said that Daniel would come to 
something Or nothing she was not SUM 
which : he thought the doubt was about 
to be settled." So the clerkship went 
its ways, and Daniel, reconciled to his 
father and satisfied with his own course, 
went back to his practice. Judge Web- 
ster lived but a vear afterward, but his 
life was long enough to enable him to 
hear his son's first argument, and to be 
gratified at the fulfilment of the promis- 
ing predictions that had been circulated 
regarding him. He diedin April, 1806. 
Mn May, 1807, Daniel, whom we shall 
now designate by the more dignified 
appellation of Mr. Webster,Vas admitted 
to practice as attorney and counsellor of 
the Supreme Court of New Hampshire, 
and in September of the same year, re- 
linquished his office to his brother 
Ezekiel, who had then obtained admis- 
sion to the Bar. Daniel then removed 
to Portsmouth. • It may here be proper 
to say that Mr. Webster always espoused 
with warmth the cause of Ezekiel, his 
only brother. A man of strong, native 
powers, though slow to action, Ezekiel 
only lacked opportunity and a longer 
life to have become a distinguished 
personage. He died in the prime of 
life, while arguing a cause in Concord, 
New Hampshire, and was lamented by 
a large class of friends and mourning 
relatives. 

Daniel Webster was married in June, 
1808, to Grace Fletcher, daughter of the 
Rev. Mr. Fletcher, of Hopkington, New 
Hampshire. They had four children — 
Grace, Fletcher, Julia, and Edward — of 
whom only Fletcher now survives. 

. Grace died early ; Edward was Killed in 
the Mexican War; Julia married one 
of the Appletons, of Boston, and died 
a few years since. 

—■"■""Mr. Webster resided in Portsmouth 
for a period of nine years. The Bar at 
* that time presented a roll of brilliant 
names. Samuel Dexter and Joseph 
Story, of Massachusetts, William K. At- 
kinson. Attorney-General of New Hamp- 
shire, Judge Jeremiah Smith, Jeremiah 
Mason, and men of like calibre, were tie- 
leading practitioners of the law. With 



them was sustained a pleasant and 
profitable intercourse, and the friendship 
which they extended to Mr. Webf 
was no small assistance to the efforts of 
the new aspirant for legal honor-. Mr. 
Webster's practice here was chiefly cir- 
cuit. He followed the Superior Court 
into many of the counties of the Si 
and was retained in most of the impor- 
tant causes upon the docket. Office he 
never held in New Hampshire, and his 
private professional practice was not 
remarkably lucrative. It has been re- 
marked, as a circumstance somewhat 
singular, that in very few cases was 
Mr. Webster employed as junior counsel. 
Scarcely a dozen instances of this 
kind occurred during his long, career. 
M eii had occasion for his services as 
their leading counsel, and reposed in 
him the utmost confidence — a reliance 
which was never misplaced or regretted, 
and to which many will now turn with 
a grateful recollection of the value of 
his aid. i 

Soon after the declaration of war 
against England, Mr. Webster was 
called to enter the arena of public life. 
Though but thirty years of age, an early 
period to take part in the councils of a 
nation — the native strength of Mr. W 
Bter'e character had already pointed him 
out as the man that was needed for the 
times; and the undeveloped statesman 
made his first step in that long career 
of public life which has identified his 
name, as Representative, Senator, Di- 
plomatist, and Cabinet Minister, with 
the history of the United States. 

MR. WEBSTER IX CONGRESS. 

The political contest which 1 in 

the election of Mr. Webster to the House 
of Representatives, was Long and spirited. 
A vehement opposition was Btarted 
against the party which hi jented, 

and although his ultimate triumph was 
gratifying in the extreme, tie ggle 

was severe. Mr. Webst* r finally re- 
ceived a very handsome majority over 
his opponent, and took hi tt the 

extra session i E the Thirteenth Con- 



/ 



B 



Life of fioniel Webster. 



press, in May, 1813. The time atwhieh what manner, the first intelligence was 
he entered Congress was one of great given to this government of the d< 
excitement. The question of the prose- of the Government of France, bearing 
CUtfon of the war was warmly agitated, date the 28th of April, 1811, and pur- 
and raised divisions of party opinion, porting to be a definitive repeal of the 
that threatened serious difficulties. The 1 teerees of Berlin and Milan." Tin 
wisdom of retorting by severe retaliatory solutions were supported by Mr. A', 
measures, agatnst the arbitrary acts of ster, in a speech of masterly power and 
Great Britain,- respecting American ship- vigor, producing facts and arguments, 
ping, was doubted by many members of j which could do no less than rivet the at- 
that Congress. The conviction of thejtention of the House. The object of 
necessity of the conflict was not general Mr. Webster was merely to obtain infor- 
throughout the country. Men objected j mation, which was fseely Communicated 
that the war bad been begun by a fac-lby President Madison. The action t>f 
tion, that it was non-essential in princi-j Napoleon in regard to the maritime 
pie, and that it needed not to be prose- 1 questions of the day was productive of 
cuted with any extraordinary degree of such measures of retaliation from Eng- 
ardor. Tnto the midst of this caldron of land, that great danger was experienced 
differing opinions, Mr. Webster was by the neutral powers which had \ 
thrown by his constituents. He was upon the ocean. Great Britain then in- 
equal to the emergency in which he sisting upon her right of search in v. s- 
found himself plunged. That Congress j sels belonging to the United States, the 



comprised men of surpassing talent. Of 
the House, Henry Clay was speaker. 
Among the members were Calhoun, For- 
syth, Grundy, Gaston, Pickering. In- 
tellect and learning shed a lustre over 
the lower House, which it has rarely 
witnessed since. Mr. Webster made his 
appearance punctually at the commence- 
ment of the Bession, and was immedi- 
ately placed by Mr. Clay upon the com- 
mittee of foreign affairs, a position of 
honor and responsibility. Air. Webster 
delivered his maiden speech in the House 
on Thursday, 10th June, 1813. It took 
Congress by surprise. A young man, 
appearingfor the first time in public life, 
and previously unknown in political cir- 



pent-up passions fotrdQ vent, and the 
mother country and her daughter were 
again embroiled in war. Mr. Wei 
entered Congress, not at the comm< 
ment of this second Btruggle, but in the 
heat of its ] . War was rag _ 

when he took his seat. The minutiae of 
the preparations for its continuance, were 
allotted to him as one of the National 
Council. Although opposed to the po- 
licy which had been adopted, he ofl 
no very serious opposition to the pi 
cution of the war, and contented himself 
with Beeking to guide the strong current 
into channels which appeared Baf< si and 
most expedient. He had always beli< 
that themosl efficient method of crippling 



cles,nad made a sudden and indelible the pqwer of England, was to attack her 



impression upon older and more expe- 
rienced men. The result has proved thai 



upon the sea, and hence, at an early pe- 
riod, he advocated the improvement of 



the early promise was not fallacious, the Navy. P.efore the commencement 



Intellect sharpened and strengthened by 
continual exercise, especially in courts 
of law, and under the excitement of ve- 
hement opposition, is pretty Bure to re- 
ceive a rapid and healthy development 



of the war. Or his entrance into * longresS', 

he had written several powerful argu- 
ments favoring an increase of our naval 

force, and one of his earliest Bpeeelv 

the House was intended to accomplish 



Mr. Webster founded bis Bpeech upon the same purpose. Other topics of ria- 

certain resolutions which be introduced tional interest and importance bIbo occu- 

in r.lation to the Berlin and Milan De- pied his attention while be continued ft 

. requesting the President "toin- member of the House. On the repeal of 

form the Qouse when, by whom, and in the Embargo, and on an appeal from the 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



Chair on a motion for the previous ques- 
tion, he Bpoke strongly and with effect 
His standing aa an orator wta speedily 
attained. It never degenerated into a 
secondary quality, and the part assumed 
by him in his earliest public efforts was 
such as few men so young have sus- 
tained, < tf the speeches of Mr. Webster 
on the embargo and on the appeal, Mr. 
Everett holds the following language: 
" His speeches on these questions raised 
him t<> the front rank of debaters. He 
manifested upon his entrance into public 
life, that variety of knowledge, familia- 
rity with the history and traditions of 
the government, and self-possession on 
the floor, which in most cases are ac- 
quired by time and long experience. 
They gained for him the reputation in- 
dicated by the well-known remark of 
Mr. Lowndes, that 'the North had not 
his equal, nor the South his superior.' " 
Mr. Webster was re-elected to the 
House of Representatives in August, 
1814. His constituents, pleased that 
New Hampshire could send so creditable 
a representative, and justly proud of the 
honorable position attained in so brief a 
period by Mr Webster, again gave him 
the preference, and he received, for the 
second time, a handsome majority. 
When he again entered upon the dis- 
charge of his, public duties, Mr. Webster 
found himself in a new position. The 
Peace was declared in December, 1814, 
and Congress had time to give its atten- 
tion to the internal affairs of the country. 
The debates no longer turned upon the 
budget of war. The commercial class 
and the mass of the people were now t<> 
receive attention, and their wants were 
to be canvassed and supplied. Govern 
ment found it convenient to propose the 
establishment of a National Hank, and a 
bill for that purpose was introduced into 
the House on the recommendation of 
Mr. Dallas, then Secretary of the Trea- 
sury. The, Bill contained provisions to 
which great opposition arose. It re- 
quired the reservation of a bank capital 
of fifty millions of dollars ; of which only 
five millions were to be in specie, and 
the remainder in the depreciated govern- 



ment securities ; with an obligation to 
lend thirty millions for the use 'of the 
Treasury. With these provisions, the 
bill had passed the Senate, and was sent 
to the House. It was wannU discussed. 
Mr. Calhoun and Mr. Webster were 
among its opponents. Mr. Webster 
deemed the project useless and perni- 
cious. He denounced it as a mere 
paper-money contrivance, which wa.-> cal- 
culated to injure the people, to increase 
the financial embarrassments of the. 
government, and to bring discredit upon 
the country. The bill, as originally re- 
ported, was finally negatived. A recon- 
sideration was then moved, and the bill 
was ameuded in several important par- 
ticulars. A specie-paying bank was 
planned, and received the support of 
Mr. Webster and those who had opposed 
so strenuously the original draft. In its 
improved shape the bill passed, and was 
sent to the President for approval, but 
Mr. Madison returned it to the House 
with his objections, and the subject went 
over for that session. 

The adjournment of Congress left Mr. 
Webster at liberty to resume his profes- 
sional occupations, and enabled him to 
pay that degree of attention to his per- 
sonal affairs of which they had stood in 
need during his long absence from home. 
In the month of January, 1814, he had 
sustained a heavy loss in the destruction 
of his house at Portsmouth by the great 
fire which visited that place. Not re- 
markably rich in the goods of this world 
at that period, Mr. Webster's finances 
suffered a serious blow by this disaster, 
and he began to agitate the question of 
removing his family either to Albany or 
Boston. This removal was effected in 
August, 1816. Mr. AVebster was well 
known in Boston as a citizen and a pro- 
fessional man. He was certain of a 
warm welcome among old friends, and 
saw many reasons why he should return 
to the field in which he first stepped for- 
ward. His practice in the e.purt- 
New Hampshire was >■ d, ex- 

cepting in the celebrated case of D 
mouth college, tried in September, 1817. 
This cause involved constitutional q 



10 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



tsons, and cnsracred the attention of Mr. 
Webster for a considerable period. The 
'ature of New Hampshire had passed 
certain acts, purporting to enlarge and 
improve the corporation of the College 
and to amend its charter. The trial was 
to test the question whether such acts 
could be binding upon the corporation, 
without its consent. Mr. Webster, 
esppusing the cause of the corporation, 
argued with his usual ability upou the 
unconstitutionality of the action of the 
legislature. Upon an adverse opinion 
of the New Hampshire Court being ren- 
dered, a writ of error was sued out by 
the corporation, and the cause was re- 
moved to the Supreme Court of the 
United States. The argument took 
place, before all the Judges, in March. 
1818; Mr. Webster and Mr. Hopkin-11 
appearing for the plaintiffs in error, and 
Mr. Holmes and the Attorney-General 
of New Hampshire in opposition. The 
question involved in the ease was pew to 
American Jurisprudence, and elicited- a 
splendid display of forensic ability from 
the opposing counsel. The argument 
of Mr. Webster served to place the mat- 
ter in its true light, and Judge Story at 
last coincided with his colleagues in de- 
claring the acts of the legislature invalid, 
and reversing the decision of the S 
perior Court of New Hampshire. 

When Mr. Webster removed to Bos- 
ton he bad one session to serve in Con- 
gress as Representative from New Hamp- 
shire. The proceedings of that session 
were unimportant. At its close be re- 
tired to his practice in Boston, where. 
for two year-, he was permitted to re- 
pose" in the exercise of the duties of pri- 
vate life. II was not, however, allowed 
any longer respite. He was soon urged 
by friends and political admirer- to be- 
come a candidate for Congress for the 
third time ; bul tdfastJy declined 

the offer. An offer of election to the 
Senate of the United State- was ten- 
dered him by his friends in the Legisla- 
ture 5 but this wa- also declined. De- 
voted to hi- profession, he bad no wish 
to withdraw himself from it. Earning a 
competency by hi- Legal attainment-, he 



desired no honors other than those 
which attached to a good citizen and an 
honest man. The community 
more strongly upon pressing him ;.. 
into the public service, lb- served for a 
short time in the Legislature, was ch 
one of the presidential electors of Mas- 
sachusetts in the canvass which result- 
ed in the re-election of Mr. Monroe, 
and was a delegate to the convention 
called to revise the Constitution of the 
Commonwealth in 1821. In that 
vention, Mr. Websti t took a promu 
part, constitutional argument bavin- 
come his forte. His principal argun 
were devoted to the subjects of oatl 
office, the division of the State into se- 
natorial districts, and the appointment 
of judicial officers by the executive. 

In the fall of 1822, after the most 
pressing solicitation, Mr. Webster yield- 
ed his consent to run again forConr; 
A committee, consisting of Col. Thomas 
H. Perkins, Wm. Sturgis, Win. Sulli- 
van, John T. Apthorp, and Daniel Mes- 
senger, called upon him to apprise him 
of his nomination. He did not nov< 
dine. He wa- elected by one thousand 
majority over his competitor. Jesse Put- 
iiimi, and again took his -eat in the 
House, — not as a member from a rural 
district in New Hampshire, but a repre- 
sentative from the city of Boston. Hen- 
ry Clav was again Speaker. Familiar 
faces greeted the vision <.<\' the M 
ohusetts Representative, and earnest dis- 
cussions presently gave active employ- 
ment to Mr. Webster's busy mind. 

Early in the Session, tin' Bubject of 
the Revolution in I came before 

the House. Mr. Webster, on the 8th ■•( 
mber, 1823, presented the following 
resolution : "That provision ought to be 
made by law for defraying the expense in- 
cident to the appointment of an age: 
commissioner to Greece, whenever the 
President shall deem it expedient to 
make such appointment." 

In hi* famous speech in support of 

this resolution, Mr. Webster Showed 

himself a profound and discriminating 

judge of the laws that govern the rela- 

of nation* and communities. In 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



11 



sympathy for the oppressed and strug- on the power of public opinion. In ar- 



gling Greeks, he was not surpassed by 

any of the men of his time. He evinced 
a ready appreciation of the evils with 
which they struggled, and uttered a 
trumpet toned and indignant remon- 
strance against the tyranny which 
sought their degradation. The " Greek 
Speech" will be remembered as long as 
American oratory has 
the records of history. 
to notice that the principles which were 
avowed on this occasion, wero subse- 
quently reaffirmed by Mr. Webster in 
language still more striking, applied to 
the affairs of Hungary. On the occa- 
sion* of the Congressional Banquet to 
Kossuth, in January last, Mr. Webster 
declared that " in the sentiments avowed 
by him in the years 1823 and 1824, in 
the cause of Greece, there was that 
which he could never part from without 
departing from himself'' Those senti- 
ments were most fearlessly put forth. 
On the 19th January, 1823, Mr. Web- 
ster made a long and eloquent argument, 
covering the whole question. Review- 
ing the circumstances which accompa- 
nied the struggles of the Greeks, and 
passing some severe strictures upon the 
policy observed by the states of Europe 
towards that unhappy country, Mr. 
Webster proceeded to a statement of the 
effects and consequences of the actions 
of European potentates in regard to free 
governments and the spread of republi- 
can institutions. The limits of this 
sketch permit no detailed analysis of the 
line of argument laid down by Mr. 
Webster in this celebrated speech, nor 
is it necessary. The leading idea was 
the defence of free institutions against 
absolutism ; an argument in favor of 

the en- 
In 



guing this point, he said : 

" Bir, this reasoning mistakes the age. 
The time has been, indeed, when fleets 
and armies, and subsidies, were the prin- 
cipal reliances even in the best cause. 
But, happily for mankind, there has ar- 
rived a great change in this respect. 
Moral causes come into consideration in 
t place among proportion as the progress of knowledge 
It is interesting I is advanced ; and the public opinion of 
the civilized world is rapidly gaining an 
ascendency over mere brutal force. It 
may be silenced by military power, but 
it cannot be conquered. It is elastic, 
irrepressible, and invulnerable to the 
weapons of ordinary warfare. It is 
that impassible, inextinguishable enemy 
of mere violence and arbitrary rule, 
which, like Milton's angels, 



regard- 
be assumed 



constitutional rights against 
croachments of despotism, 
ing the position proper to 
by this country, in reference to the 
Geeek struggle, Mr. Webster gave ut- 
terance to one of the finest passages 
vhich the language has produced. He 
sought to discourage any violent and 
belligerent measures, and fell back up- 



' Vital in every part, 
Cannot, but by annihilating, die.' 

Unless this be propitiated or satisfied, it 
is in vain for power to talk either of 
triumphs or repose. No matter what 
fields are desolated, what fortresses sur- 
rendered, what armies subdued,, or what 
provinces overrun, there is an enemy 
that still exists to check the glory of 
these triumphs. It follows the conquer- 
or back to the very scene of his ova- 
tions ; it calls upon him to take notice 
that the world, though silent, is yet in- 
dignant; it shows him that the sceptre 
of his victory is a barren sceptre ; that 
it shall confer neither joy nor honor, 
but shall moulder to dry ashes in his 
crrasp. In the midst of his exultation, 
it pierces his ear with the cry of injured 
justice; it denounces against him the 
indignation of an enlightened and civi- 
lized age ; it turns to bitterness the cup 
of his rejoicing, and wounds him with 
the sting which belongs to the consciooe- 
ness of having outraged the opinion of 
mankind." 

In the course of this speech, Mr. 
Webster adverted, in terms of reproba- 
tion, to the Treaty of Taris of 1815, by 
which the principles that bound together 
the " Holy Alliance " were asserted and 



12 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



maintained. He expressed bis abhor- 
rence of the doctrines thus sought to be 
enforced by European Despotisms, and 
remarked; "Human liberty may yet, 
perhaps, be obliged to repose its princi- 
pal hopes on the intelligence and the 
vigor of the Saxon race. So far as de- 
pends on us, at least, I trust those hopes 
will not be disappointed." 

Mr. Webster also took an active part 
in the discussions upon the Tariff in 
1824. In common with the remainder 
of the Massachusetts delegation, he op- 
posed that instrument on grounds of ex- 
pediency, but the bill waa passed and 
became a law. 

In the Fall of 1824, Mr. Webster was 
reelected to Congress, by the almost 
unanimous vote of 4,990 out of 5,000. 
This remarkable indication of the public 
favor was as unexpected as well-merited 
and gratifying. Mr. Webster was now 
fairly settled in a public career, and he 
was thenceforward but rarely absent 
from stations of trust and confidence. 

The Presidential contest in which 
John Quincy Adams was finally sue, 
ful, new agitated the country. Mr. Clay 
accepted the post of Secretary of Si 
The principal topic of this administra- 
tion was the Panama Mission, a Bubjecl 
of dispute, which created a great sensa- 
tion, and elieited many warm debates in 
Congress. Mr. Webster had supported 
with earnestness, the noted Declaration 
of President Monroe, — that any combi- 
nations of European powers to promote 
certain objects in America would be 
considered as directly affecting the Na- 
tion, — and, in accordance with the posi- 
tion he had assumed, gave :' ''"l'dial BUp- 

port to the proposed Mission to Panama, 

for the settlement of existing difficulties. 

HI'' made an able speech on this Bubject 

in the House, in April, 1826. The 
general unpopularity of the measure in 
contemplation, however, caused it t" 

fail. 

-On the 22d December, 1820, at die 

■'•nd » ieutenriial Celebration of the 

landing of the Pilgrims at Plymouth, 

Mr. Webster delivered the grand Ora- 



tion which is now in the mouth of 
every schoolboy. Five years afterward, 
in 1825, he spoke at Bunker Hill, at the 
semi-centennial Celebration of the glo- 
rious Battle which had there been 
fought. In a few months, he was call- 
ed to commemorate the services of 
Adams and Jefterson, whose deaths oc- 
curred under circumstances of such 
curious coincidence. On the 22d Fe- 
bruary, 1832, upon the completion of a 
century from the birth of Washing 
Mr. Webster was called upon to deliver 
an Address at the National Capital, and 
enchained the attention of his audience, 
by a fascinating delineation of the \ ir- 
tues of the Father of his country. *""" 
^4n November, 1820, Mr. Webster was 
again solicited to represent his District 
iu the House, for the third time, but be- 
fore he had taken his seat, a va- 
occurring in the Senate by the retire- 
ment of the venerable Elijah H. Mills, 
Mr. Webster was chosen to fill that post. 
Toward the close of the year 1827. a 
heavy domestic affliction was visited 
upon Mr. Webster, in the loss of his 
wife. They were on the way to Wash- 
ington when Mrs. Webster was taken ill, 
and soon died.-' This melancholy event 
prevented Mr. Webster from taking his 
seat in the senate, until January, 18 

In the senatorial career of Mr. Web- 
ster, so many elements of power and 
popularity have passed into record, that 
it is difficult to embrace, in a simple 
sketch, all the peculiar features of the 
great movements in which he took part. 
Mr. Calhoun, as Vice President, i 
pied the Chair of the Senate. Messrs. 
Forsyth, Benton, Van Buren, Woodbury, 
Tazewell/ flayton and Eayne/werean 
the Senators. Mr. Webster^ first par- 
liamentary encounter, aponhis entrance 
into the senate, took place with Mr. 
\ril of Virginia. The Bubject in 

dispute was the Process Bill, conta 
for the regulation <>f the proceedings of 
United States Courts, and the details 
the controversy had little public int 
Mi. Webster afterward made strong ai 
praiseworthy exertions in aid of tl 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



13 



measures of relief to the surviving offi- 
cers of the revolution. In regard to the 
tariff, upon which the controversy of 
past days was renewed, Mr. Webster 
deemed it his duty to vote for the 
amended bill introduced into the Senate. 
In the course of his remarks upon cer- 
tain objections which he had urged 
against the measure, and for which he 
sought an improvement, he defended 
New England from the injurious reports 
that had been circulated against her, and 
established anew the credit of that large 
and industrious section of the country. 
Though disapproving of some of the 
provisions contained in the amended bill, 
he yet believed it an improvement in cer- 
tain particulars, and gave it his affirm- 
ative vote — a course which he deemed 
it but just to explain to his constituents 
upon his return home. In a speech at 
Faneuil Hall he made particular allusion 
to the circumstances of that vote, and 
received the approval of the people of 
the Commonwealth. 

DEBATE WITH HAYNE. 

The next event in Mr. Webster's life 
was one which won imperishable laurels 
for himself, and cast lustre upon the 
councils of his country. It was the part 
he took in the great controversy in the 
Senate between the north and south — 
between the national views of the Con- 
stitution which Mr. Webster had often 
vindicated, and the doctrines of state 
rights, which had been tor years so ably 
enforced by Mr. Calhoun, and had 
reached a position of commanding in- 
fluence. % 

General Jackson had been elected to 
the Presidency in the fall of 1828, by 
an overwhelming popular majority, 
against John Quiney Adams, whose ad- 
ministration, although marked by signal 
ability, and a purity seldom paralleled 
'•m th e recent history of our government, 
viiled to fasten itself upon the popu- 
rmpathy. Mr. Adams was a mau 
harp intellect, multifarious know- 
, large experience in public affairs, 
}f cold, calm courage, but without 



a spark of enthusiasm in his nature, or 
any of those qualities which command 
the attachment and secure the support 
of gnat masses of men. General Jack- 
son, on the contrary, lacking all the 
faculties which his opponent had, pos- 
sessed all those which he lacked. A man 
of clear perceptions, prompt and gene- 
rous impulses — unflinching as a friend 
and relentless as a foe — daring in action, 
and of unconquerable will, and con- 
spicuous in the eyes of the whole coun- 
try for his victory at New Orleans in the 
war of 1812, he had come into power 
"by a larger majority than had ever be- 
fore been given to any candidate. And 
among his friends were those who had 
before been distinguished for devotion to 
Mr. Calhoun, and the friends of Mr. 
Crawford. Mr. Calhoun was chosen 
Vice President at the same election. 
Thus, though overwhelmingly strong, 
the Democratic party was really com- 
posed of discordant materials — being 
divided especially upon the fundamental 
principles upon which our government 
rests — Mr. Calhoun and his friends, in- 
sisting upon a strict construction of the 
constitution, and the most rigid limita- 
tion of the powers of the general govern- 
ment under it, and the other section in- 
heriting by legitimate descent the more 
liberal and national doctrines of Madi- 
son and Monroe, and being friendly to 
the protection of American industry, and 
the prosecution of WOrta of internal im- 
provement. Both these parties were, 
however, at this time, united in cordial 
support of General Jackson, and in an 
equally cordial hostility to the leaden 

of the party against which he had 1 n 

elected, and among these leaders Mr. 
Webster, of course, Btood pre-eminent 
The first session of the Twenty-first 
Congress opened in December, I 
Mr. Calhoun presiding in the Senate. 
Prominent among the topics to which 
political attention was directed, was 
that of the public land-. Both pa 
and especially both sections of the coun- 
try, the North and the South. 1 
anxious to secure the political alliance 
of the Western States ; and although 



14 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



the measures of each were doubtless 
dictated mainly by a sincere regard for 
the public good, it is not uncharitable 
to suppose that political purposes had 
more or less influence with both. Little, 
however, had been said upon the sub- 
ject until Mr. Foote, of Connecticut, on 
the 29th of Dec, introduced the follow- 
ing apparently innocent resolution of 
inquiry : 

"Resolved, That the Committee on 
Public lands be instructed to inquire and 
report the quantity of Public lands re- 
maining unsold within each State and 
Territory, and whether it be expedient 
to limit for a certain period the sales of 
public lands, to such lands as have here- 
tofore been offered for sale, and are now 
subject to entry at the minimum price. 
And also whether the office of Surveyor 
General, and some of the land office-. 
may not be abolished, without detri- 
ment to the public service." 

It has been alleged that this resolution 
was in reality the signal and starting 
point of a predetermined crusadt 
the part of General Jackson's friends 
against New England, and especially 
Mr. Webster, as its most conspicuous 
and formidable representative. At the 
time, however, no such purpose was sus- 
pected ; and it is only by reverting to 
the concurrent features of the case that 
subsequent examination has brought 
circumstantial ei idence in support of the 
charge. Mr. Webster, it is certain, was 
fast at that time mad.' the shining mark 
for the combined attacks of the party 
in power. The party press throughout 
ill.- country Bought to evince its devo- 
tion to General, Jackson, by assaults 
upon Ear. Webster. The leading friends 
of the President and Vice-President, in 
both Bouses ol Congress and through- 
out the country, aimed their most power- 
ful blows at his head, with an energy 
and determination which might well 
suggest the Buspioion of a precono 
purpose. It stents more lik< |j . bow- 
ever, that this was limply the result 

of the position of parti.-; and of their 

prominent men. The Presidential con- 
test had been marked by great warmth 



and bitterness, and this zeal had not 
been in the least diminished by the 
complete success by which it had been 
crowned. The dominant party, on the 
contrary, seemed the more resolute in 
its purpose of destroying and annihilat- 
ing all opposition — and as New England 
was the citadel of that hostility, and Mr. 
Webster the solitary but formidable 
champion who defended its gates, and 
hurled the crushing missiles of war from 
its unconquered towers, it was natural 
and indeed inevitable, that their main 
assault should be turned against him, 
and the section which he represented. 
The day after Mr. Foote offered his 
solution, on calling it up for considera- 
tion, he said he had presented it from 
having seen a statement in the last re- 
port of the commissioners of the land 
office, that the quantity of land remain- 
ing unsold at the minimum price of one 
dollar and a quarter per acre, exceeded 
seventy-two millions of acres — while the 
annual demand was n.»t likely greatly 
to exceed one million acres — and he was 
desirous of further official information 
upon the subject. 

Senator Benton, of Missouri, — then, 
as now, wide awake and keenly suspi- 
cious of designs on himself and the 
W( st, whenever any Western topic was 
touched in debate, — scented the battle 
afar off', in this formal and ostensibly 
harmless resolution. He stigmati/d it 
at on solution of inquirj into 

the expediency of committing a serious 
injury upon the new States of the V. 
Mr. Foote earnestly disclaimed any such 
purpose, and several other senators vin- 
dicated the resolution from arry such 
construction. After a brief and collo- 
quial controversy, not wholly void of 
feeling, opon this point, a motion 
carried postponing the further consi- 
deration of the Bubject until Monday, 
the 11th of January, for which day it 
wasmade the special order. When that 

• lav arrived, it was again postponed until 
the 1 3th ; and then, after several Western 

gentlemen had spoken briefly upon it, it 

was laid over until Monday, the 18th. On 
that day, and evidently after much pre- 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



15 



paration and an evident nursing of his 
political wrath, Mr. Benton took the 
floor against the resolution. His speech 
was the development of the idea he had 
put forth at the outset, — that the resolu- 
tion was aimed at the West; and he 
proceeded to show that the attack came 
from New England, and that it was 
really directed against him. " The re- 
solution," said he, " was introduced to 
check-mate my graduation bill ! It was 
an offer of battle to the West ! I ac- 
cepted the offer; I am fighting the 
battle ; some are crying out and hauling 
off; but I am standing to it, and mean 
to stand to it. I call upon the adver- 
sary to come on and lay on ; and I tell 
him, 

1 Damn'd be he that first cries hold, — enough !' " 

Col. Benton proceeded to a studied 
attack upon New England — to a denun- 
ciation of her policy towards the West 
as illiberal and unjust — and to the de- 
claration that the West would here- 
after look to the South for succor. This 
was the key-note of the debate that 
followed. The real merits of the ques- 
tion rapidly gave way to a discussion 
of the relative position of different sec- 
tions of the country towards it. The 
next day Mr. Holmes, of Maine, 
replied at length to Mr. Benton. Other 
senators also participated in the dis- 
cussion, and finally Col. Hayne, of 
South Carolina, commenced a speech 
which consumed the rest of the day. 

Hayne was one of the younger sena- 
tors — of undoubted ability and over- 
confident courage. He had filled with 
eclat successive offices of trust and 
resp&nsihility in his native State, and 
brought to the Senate, in 1823, a 
brilliant and growing reputation. His 
characteristics have been well set forth 
by Mr. March, in his Reminiseenca of 
Congress. " Hayne," he Bays, - dashed 
into debate like the Mameluke cavalry 
upon a charge. There was a gallant 
air about him, that could not but win 
admiration. He never provided for 
retreat: he never imagined it- He 



had an invincible confidence in himself, 
which arose partly from constitutional 
temperament, partly from previous 
success. His was the Napoleonic war- 
fare : to strike at once for the capital 
of the enemy, heedless of danger or loss 
to his own forces. Not doubting to 
overcome all odds, he feared none, how- 
ever seemingly superior. Of great 
fluency and no little force of expression, 
his speech never halted, and seldom 
fatigued, nis oratory was graceful and 
persuasive. An impassioned manner, 
somewhat vehement at times, but rarely, 
if ever, extravagant : a voice well mo- 
dulated and clear : a distinct, though 
rapid enunciation : a confident, but not 
often offensive address : these, accompa- 
nying and illustrating language well 
selected, and periods well turned, made 
him a popular and effective speaker." 
In his speech at this stage of the 
debate, Col. Hayne took occasion to 
respond to Col. Benton, by assuring 
him that the West might always count 
upon the sympathies of the South, and 
by echoing and strengthening the 
assaults he had made upon the cha- 
racter and conduct of New England. 
He alleged that the East was unwilling 
that the public lands should be thrown 
open on easy terms to settlers, for fear 
of being drained of its population. The 
Eastern States, he said, had always 
sought to retain their population at 
home — " to create a manufactory of 
paupers, who should supply the manu- 
factories of rich proprietors, and enable 
them to amass great wealth." He 
followed up this attaek upon the policy 
of New England with great bitterness — 
characterizing her course on the public 
lands especially as selti.-h and unprin- 
cipled. Neither Mr. Webster nor hi-. 
friends could help feeling sensitive 
under such assaults and point 
given to their resentment by the 1 ■• 
that they were mainly directed against 
Mr. Webster personally, and i 
intended as much to crush him as to 
promote the welfare of the West At 
the previous session, OoL Hayne had 
made a sharp attack upon hi> opinions 



16 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



and conduct, to which, however, he had 
forborne to make any reply. But upon 
this occasion, he felt called on to re- 
spond ; and on the next day, therefore, 
he -poke at some length in reply — con- 
fining himself clearly to the topic under 
discussion, and referring only incident- 
ally to the temper in which the debate 
had been conducted on the part of his 
opponents. His speech was little more, 
indeed, than a very clear and well- 
digested historical statement of the 
actual steps taken by the General Go- 
vernment in regard to the public lands, 
and of the part which New England 
had borne in that action. He depicted 
with graphic power the wonderful 
changes which had taken place in the 
Western States — their rapid and mar- 
vellous increase of population, and the 
almost magic transformation of their 
unbroken forests into the abodes of 
civilization and comfort. And in regard 
to the measures of the General Govern- 
ment by which this change had been 
wrought, he u undertook to say," in 
general terms — sustaining the state- 
ment, however, by reference to the 
records of Congress — that "if you look 
to the votes on any one of tin-,' 
ni'-asures, and strike out from the list 
of ayes the names of New England 
members, it will be found that in i 
the S hi would then have voted 

(hmm the West, and the measure would 

have failed." This sweeping declaration, 
made with exactness and emphasis, was 
a direct acceptance of the issue mad.-. 
between the North and South, in 
ird to the respective conduct of each 
-it towards the West He closed 
by apologizing for thus alluding to local 
opinions and contrasting different por- 
tions of the country — a oourse which, 
he said, had been forced upon him by 
charges and imputations on the public 
character and conduct of the State 
which he represented, which he knev< 
to lie undeserved and unfounded. 
•• While i Btand bere,' 1 said be, " as 
representative of Massachusetts, I will 
be her true representative, and, by the 
blessing of Goo, 1 will vindicate her 



character, motives, and history from 
every imputation coming from a 
able source." Col. Benton followed 
Mr. Webster, and at once commenced 
a speech in reply. The next dav 
(Thursday, the 21st), Mr. Chambers, of 
Maryland, expressed .a hope that the 
Senate would postpone the further con- 
sideration of the subject until the next 
Monday, as Mr. Webster, who desired 
to be present whenever it should be 
resumed, had pressing engagements in 
another quarter, and could not con- 
veniently attend in the Senate. It was 
well understood that a legal case of a 
good deal of importance, in which John 
Jacob Astor and the State of New York 
were parties, and in which Mr. W< 
was of counsel — was pending in the 
Supreme Court, and the argument had 
actually commenced on the 20th, Col. 
ilayne, however, resented the 
tion of postponement. He said, " he 
saw the gentleman from Massachut 
in his seat, and pi i he could 

make an arrangement which would 
enable him to attend." 11- was un- 
willing that the subject should be j 

i until he could reply to certain 

■various which had fallen from Mr. 
Webster the day before. Unable, and 

aring, to restrain evidences of the 
feeling which Mr. Webster's speech had 
excited, he confessed that some th 
had fallen from him On that occasion 
which rankled here (touching his heart), 
and he desired at once to relieve him- 
self. "The gentleman,*' said he. "has 
discharged his tire in the face of the 
senate; and I hope the opportunity will 
now he afforded nie of returning the 
diot." menaces implied in this 

language, of com Mr. Webster no 

alternative. With a and 

lofty dignity of manner, li<- • ^claimed : 
•• Let the discussion proceed. I am 
ready. 1 am ready row to receive the 
gentleman's tire." The discussion, of 
course, did proa , Col. Benton 
finished his speech ; and Mr. Bell, of 
New Hampshire, then moved that the 
further consideration of the sub 

postponed until Monday. Thia was lost 



1. e of Dan it I IT* bstcr. 



17 



by a party vote. And Col. Ilayne at 
once commenced his speech in reply to 
Mr. Webster, 

He spoke on that occasion for about 
an hour. He began by disavowing hav- 
ing had any purpose of charging any 
section of the country with hostility to 
any other, and by professing surprise at 
the manner in which his remarks had 
been received. He had questioned no 
man's opinion ; he impeached no man's 
motives. The Senator from Missouri 
had indeed charged upon the Eastern 
States, an early and continued hostility 
towards the West ; but, after deliberat- 
ing a whole night, the gentleman from 
Massachusetts had come into the Senate 
to vindicate New England, and instead 
of making up his issue with the gentle- 
man from Missouri, on the charge which 
he had preferred, said Col. H., " he 
chooses to consider me as the author of 
those charges ; selects me as his adver- 
sary, and pours out all the vials of his 
mighty wrath upon my devoted head. 
Nor is he willing to stop there. He goes 
on to assail the institutions and policy 
of the South, and calls in question the 
principles and conduct of the State 
which I have the honor to represent." 
Col. Ilayne went on to suggest reasons 
for this course, on the part of Mr. Web- 
ster. " Has he discovered," he asked, 
" in former controversies with the gen- 
tleman from Missouri, that he is over 
matched by that Senator ; and does he 
hope for an easy victory over a more 
feeble adversary ? Has his distempered 
fancy been disturbed by gloomy fore- 
bodings of the ' new alliances to be 
formed,' at which he hinted i Has the 
ghost of the murdered Coalition come 
back, like the ghost of Ban quo, to 'sear 
the eye-balls ' of the gentleman \ and 
will it not 'down at his bidding V Are 
dark visions of broken hopes and honors 
lost for ever, still floating before his 
heated imagination?" And he pro- 
ceeded to sav, that he would not suffer 
Mr. Webster thus to thrust him between 
the gentleman from Missouri and him- 
self, in order to rescue the East from the 
contest with the West — wlu'ch he had 



provoked. "The South shall not be 
forced into a conflict not its own. The 
gallant West needs no aid from the 
South to repel any attack which maybe 
made on them from any quarter." With 
this exordium, well calculated to stimu- 
late interest, and to prepare the way for 
a severe personal collision, Col. Hayne 
went on to repel the idea that the 
West had grown 'great in consequence 
of the measures of the General Govern- 
ment, upon which Mr. Webster had 
pronounced what he styled an extrava- 
gant eulogium. He ridiculed also the 
pretensions preferred by Mr. Webster 
to prominence as a statesman, on behalf 
of a "certain Nathan Dane, of Beverly, 
Massachusetts," who was only known to 
the South, he said*, as " a member of a 
celebrated assembly, called and known 
by the/" name of the Hartford Conven- 
tion.'/ His next point was to show that, 
in 1825, Mr. Webster had held and ex- 
pressed upon the subject of the public 
lands, precisely the views which he him- 
self had now advanced, and which Mr. 
Webster had assailed. " In 1825," said 
he, " the gentleman told the world that 
the public lands ought not to be treated 
as a treasure. He now tells us that 
they ' must be treated as so much trea- 
sure.' What the deliberate opinion of 
the gentleman on this subject may be, 
belongs* not to me to determine ; but I 
do not think he can, with the shadow of 
justice or propriety, impugn my senti- 
ments, while his own recorded opinions 
'are identical with my own." Col. II. 
next took up Mr. Webster's claim 
that the East had always shown its 
fri endlessness towards the West, by 
favoring internal improvements — from 
which the South had been deterred by 
its constitutional Bcruples. He alleged, 
in reply, that the only occasion in winch 
the East had thus favored the West, 
was in 1825, when the Presidential 
election was pending in the House of 
Representatives. There it was, he said, 
that " a happy union between the mem- 
bers of the celebrated coa/iti**,, was con- 
summated, whose immediate issue WM 
a President tr.'in one quarter of the 



18 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



ii, with the succession, as it was 
supposed, to another." Referring next 
to the intimation thrown out by Mr. 
Webster, that the extraordinary fervor 
of the South for the payment of the 
national debt, arose from a disposition to 
weaken the ties which bind the people 
to the Union, Col. Hayne repudiated 
the idea for the South, that a pecuniary 
dependence on the Federal Government 
was one of the legitimate means of hold- 
ing the State together. And coming 
then to the claim of Mr. "Webster, that 
the transcendent prosperity of Ohio had 
been due in a great degree to the ordi- 
nance of 1787, which had "secured to 
her a population of free men" Col. 11. 
entered into an extended rebuke of this 
attack upon Southern slavery, contrast- 
ing the condition of the slaves with that 
of the free blacks of the North, denying 
that slavery was an element of w< akn< — 
to the South, stigmatizing the friend- 
ship professed for the blacks as spring- 
ing from thespirit of false philanthropy, 
" which, like the father of evil, is con- 
stantly walking to and fro about the 
earth seeking whom it may devour," 
and claiming that slavery had been the 
means of greatly elevating the individual 
character of the Southern people. Be 
next assailed Mr. Webster's position iii 
rd to the consolidation of the 
Government, provided for by the Con- 
stitution — insisting that the Union was 
not designed to be national, but federal ; 
and then, referring to the Bubjecl of the 
tariff, charged Mr. Webster with glaring 
inconsistency in having advocated free 
trade in 1824, and m 1828 having 
supported the tariff — which had been 
known ever since as the M bill of abomi 
nation-." 

Col. Hayne closed his speech on that 
day by citing Mr. Webster's intimation 
that there was a party in the South who 
were looking to disunion. It the 
Ration had been vague and general, he 
said he should have passed it without 
notic . But as Mr. NN ebsteT had given 

to it a local habitation and a name, bj 

quoting the expression of a distinguished 

citizen of South Carolina, (l>r. Cooper,) 



that "it was time for the South to cal- 
culate the value of the Union," and in 
the language of the bitterest sarcasm to 
add, " surely then the Union cannot last 
longer than July, 1831," it was impos- 
sible to mistake either the allusion or 
the object. And he finished by pro- 
testing that this controversy was not of 
eking : that at the time this unpro- 
voked and uncalled for attack was made 
upon the South, not one word had been 
uttered by him in disparagement of N< w 
England, nor had he most distant allu- 
sion either to the Senator from Massa- 
chusetts, or the State which he repre- 
sents. " But, sir," he added, M that g 
tleman has thought proper, for purposes 
best known to himself, to strike the 
South, through me. the most unworthy 
of her servants. He has crossed the 
border, he has invaded the State of 
South Carolina, is making war upon her 
citizens, and endeavouring to overthrow 
her principles and her institutions. Sir, 
when the gentleman provokes me to 
such a conflict, I meet him at the thres- 
hold. I will struggle while I have life, 
for our altars and our firesides — and if 
God gives me strength, 1 will drive back 
the invader discomfited. Nor shall I 
stop there. If the gentleman provokes 
the war. he shall have war. Sir, 1 will 
not stop at the border — I will tarry the 
war into the enemy'B territory, and not 
consent to lay down my arms until I 
have obtained indemnity for the past 
and security for the future. It is with 
unfeigned reluctance. Mr. President, that 
I enter upon the performance of this 
part of ray duty — 1 shrink almost in- 
stinctively from a coin--. ! owever, 
ii. c ssarj . which may have a I 

to excite sectional feelings and Sectional 
jealousies. But, Sir. the task has been 
forced upon me ; and I proce< d right 

onward to the performance of my duty. 

Be the consequences what they may, 

sponsibility is with those who have 

imposed upon me the necessity. The 

Senator from Massachusetts has thought 

proper to cast the firsl stone; and if he 
shall find, according to a homely adage, 
that he ' lives in a glass house,' on his 



Life of Daniel WebsU r. 



19 



head be the consequences." And with 
this formidable warning, Bavouring far 

more of arrogant confidence than of 
dignity and good taste, Col. Hayne gave 
way to a motion to adjourn until Mon- 
day, which wag carried. The interven- 
ing time was spent in preparing to rivet 
and strengthen the impression already 
made against Mr. Webster. The bold- 
ness of the attack, the direct personality 
which the debate had assumed, and the 
vehemence of the orator's language and 
manner had given great force to the 
speech ; and it was generally felt that he 
had made a formidable and effective 
onset. Col. Hayne was warmly congra- 
tulated by all his party friends upon his 
success, and was stimulated to renewed 
assaults. The party press swelled the 
acclamations with which his speech was 
greeted, and extolled it as the greatest 
effort of ancient or of modern times. 
Mr. Webster's friends, moreover, were 
not free from misgivings. Though by 
no means lacking confidence in the 
ability of their great leader, they had 
never seen him exposed to an attack of 
precisely this character, and could not, 
therefore, be fully assured as to the man- 
ner in which he would meet it. Some 
of the friends of Col. Hayne, it is said, 
who had felt Mr. Webster's power 
directed against themselves, were by no 
means sure that the victory would rest 
with their own champion. To a friend of 
Hayne, who was praising his speech, 
Mr. Iredell, of South Carolina, remark- 
ed : " He has started the lion, but wait 
till we hear him roar or feel his claws." 
• On Monday, in continuing his speech, 
Col. Ilavne spoke first, in impassioned 
terms, of the services rendered to the 
countrv by Smith Carolina, during the 
War of the Revolution, in the political 
crisis of 1798, and during the War of 
1812. And he then proceeded to a de- 
tailed denunciation of the conduct of 
New-England, and especially of Massa- 
chusetts, in that contest with (treat Bri- 
tain, alleging that they had taken sides 
with the enemy and against their own 
countrv, and sustaining his accusation 
by copious citations from the Federal 



newspapers, partisan speeches, and pul- 
pit declamations of that day. He then 
entered upon an exposition and vindica- 
tion of the theoryoithe Federal Govern- 
ment as held by the South, in opposition 
to the theory of Consolidation, for which, 
as he alleged, Mr. Webster was contend- 
ing, quoting Jefferson and Madison, and 
resolutions passed by the Legislatures of 
several Southern States, in support of 
his view, and closing his speech by an 
earnest declaration that in all the steps 
she had taken to resist the encroach- 
ments and usurpations of the Federal 
Government, South Carolina was acting 
on a principle she had always held 
sacred, " resistance to unauthorized 
taxation." " Sir," he exclaimed in con- 
clusion, " if acting on these high motives 
— if animated by that ardent love of 
liberty wdiich has always been the most 
prominent trait of the Southern charac- 
ter — we should be hurried beyond the 
bounds of a cold and calculating pru- 
dence, who is there with one noble and 
generous sentiment in his bosom, that 
would not be disposed, in the language 
of Burke, to exclaim, ' You must pardon 
something to the spirit of Liberty.' ' 

The onset was over. And, as would 
have been the case had the attack been 
less formidable than it was, victory 
rested with the only party whose forces 
had been displayed. Mr. W( ster im- 
mediately rose to reply, but, as it was 
late in the day, he gave way to a mo- 
tion to adjourn. Everywhere during the 
evening and night following, the speech 
was canvassed. "The town," Bays Mr. 
March, " was divide-. 1 into geographical 
opinions. One's home could be dis- 
tinguished from his countenance or man- 
ner ; a Southerner's by his buoyant, 
joyous expression and confident air; a 
Yankee's by his timid, anxious eye, and 
depressed bearing. One walked with a 
bold, determined step that courted ob- 
servation; the other with a hesital 
shuffling gait, that seemed to lone for 
some dark corner, some place to 
and see, and be una Mr. W 

fell entirely : ' ability to meet 

' both the argument and the assault, and 



20 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



was p-rfectly calm and self-] 
Mr. Everett, recording a conversation 
which he had with Mr. Webster at the 
time, speaks of the dry business-tone in 
which he talked and read over to him, 
the points he intended to make, as giv- 
ing him some uneasiness for fear In- was 
not sufficiently aware how much was 
expected of him the next day. He had, 
of course, taken full notes of Colonel 
Hayne'e speech, and had given to 
part of it a careful and exhaustive con- 
sideration. Not a quotation nor an allu- 
sion had escaped him. It is mentioned 
that, while lying down after dinner, he 
was overheard, by a friend, laughing to 
himself. On being asked what am 
him so, he replied, " I have been think- 
ing of the way in which Col. llayne's 
quotation about Banquo's ghost can be 
turned against himself; and I am going 
to get up and make a note of it," which 
he immediately did. The scenes and 
incidents of the next day are so vividly 
presented in one of the chapters of Mr. 
March's Reminiscences, [published by 
Mr. (hail.- Scribner, and which he 
politely permit- us to use.] and the 
sketch lias so much of literary, as well 
as biographical interest, that we transfer 
k, with trilling omissions, to our pages : 

"It was on Tuesday. January the 
2Gth, 1830, — a day to be hereafter for 
ever memorable in Senatorial annals, — 
that the Senate resumed the consider- 
ation of Foote'a Resolution. Therenever 
was before, in the city, an occasion of 
so much excitement To witness this 
great intellectual contest, multitude 
strangers had for two or three days pre- 
vious been rushing into the city, and 
the hotels overflowed. As early as nine 
o'clock of this morning, crowds poured 
into the Capitol, in hot haste; at twelve 
o'clock, the hour of meeting, the Senate 
Chamber, — its galleries, Boors, and even 
lobbies, — was tilled to its utmost capa- 
city. The wry stairway- were dark 
with men, who hung on to one another, 
like beefl in a swarm. 

"The House of Representatives was 
early deserted. An adjournment would 
have hardly made it emptier. The 



ker, it is true, retained his chair, 
but no business of moment was, or 
could be attended to. Members all 
d in to hear Mr. Webster, and no 
call of the House or other Parliament- 
ary proceedings could compel them 
back. The floor of the Senate was so 
ly crowded that persons once in 
could not get out, nor change their po- 
sition ; in the rear of the Vi< • 1 
dential chair, the crowd was particularly 
intense. Dixon II. Lewis, then a i 
sentative from Alabama, became w< 
J in here. From his enormous size, it 
'was impossible for him to move, without 
displacing a vast portion of the multi- 
tude. Unfortunately too, for him, he 
jammed in directly behind the 
chair of the Vice-President, where he 
could not see, and hardly hear, the 
-speaker. By slow and laborious effort — 
pausing occasionally to breathe, he 
gained one of the windows, which, con- 
structed of painted glass, flank the 
chair of the Vice-President on either 
side. Here he paused, unable to make 
more headway. But determined \t 
Mr. Webster as h . with his 

knife he made a large hole in one of the 
panes of the glass, which is still visible 
as he made it. Many w< laced, as 

not to be able to see the speaker at 
all. 

" The courtesy of Senators accorded 
to the fairer sex room on the Boor — the 
most gallant of them, their own - 
The gay bonnets and brilliant dr- 
threw a varied and picturesqu< beauty 
over the scene, softening and embellish- 
ing it. 

"Seldom, if ever, has speaker in this 
or any other country had more powerful 
incentives to exertion; a subject, the 
determination of which involved the 
most important inter.-'.-...!..': even du- 
ration, of the republic; competitors, 
unequalled in reputation, ability, or po- 
sition ; a name to make still more 
glorious, or lose forever; an audi. 
comprising not only persons of this 
country moat eminent in intellectual 
greatness, but representatives of other 
nations, where the art of eloquence had 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



21 



soldier 



flourished for ages. All the 
seeks in opportunity was here. 

" Mr. Webster perceived, and felt 
equal to the destinies of the moment. 
The very greatness of the hazard exhi- 
larated him. Bis spirits rose with the 
occasion. He awaited the time of the 
onset with a stern and impatient joy. 
He felt, like the war-horse of the Scrip- 
tures, — who ' paweth in the valley, and 
rejoiceth in his strength : who goeth on 
to meet the armed men, — who sayeth 
among the trumpets, ' Ha, ha ! and 
who smelleth the battle afar off, the 
thunder of the captains and the shout- 
ing.' 

" A confidence in his own resources, 
springing from no vain estimate of his 
power, but the legitimate offspring of 
previous severe mental discipline, sustain- 
ed and excited him. He had gauged 
his opponents, his subject, and himself. 

" He was too, at this period, in the 
very prime of manhood. He had reach- 
ed middle age — an era in the life of 
man, when the faculties, physical or 
intellectual, may be supposed to attain 
their fullest organization, and most per- 
fect development. Whatever there was 
in him of intellectual energy and vitality, 
the occasion, his full life, and high am- 
bition, might well bring forth. 

u He never rose on an ordinary oc- 
casion, to address an ordinary audience, 
more self-possessed. There wasnotremu- 
lousness in his voice or manner ; "nothing 
harried, nothing simulated. The calm- 
or strength was visible every 
where ; in countenance, voice, and bear- 
ing. A deep-seated conviction of the 
extraordinary character of the emer- 
gency. an<l of his ability to control it, 
seemed to p him wholly. If an 

observer, ui*>re than ordinarily keen- 



pone the ordinary preliminaries of Sena- 
torial action, and take up, immediately, 
the consideration of the resolution. 

" Mr. Webster rose and addressed the 
Senate. His exordium is known by 
heart everywhere : ' Mr. President, when 
the mariner has been tossed for many 
days in thick weather, and on an un- 
known sea, he naturally avails himself 
of the first pause in the storm, the ear- 
liest glance of the sun, to take his latitude, 
and ascertain how far the elements have 
driven him from his true course. Let 
us imitate this prudence ; and before 
we float further on the waves of this 
debate, refer to the point from which 
we departed, that we may, at least, be 
able to form some conjecture where we 
now are. I ask for the reading of the 
resolution.' 

"There wanted no more to enchain 
the attention. There was a sponta- 
neous, though silent expression of eager 
approbation, as the orator concluded 
these opening remarks; and while the 
Clerk read the resolution, many attempt- 
ed the impossibility of getting nearer 
the speaker. Every head was inclined 
closer' towards him, every ear turned in 
the direction of his voice — and \\\at 
deep, sudden, mysterious silence follow- 
ed, which always attends fulness of 
emotion. From the sea of upturned 
faces, before him, the orator beheld his 
tli' 'Ughts reflected as from a mirror. 
The varying countenance, the suffused 
eye, the earnest smile, and ever-attentive 
look, assured him of his audience's entire 
sympathy. If among his hearers there 
were those who affected, at first, an 
indifference to his glowing thoughts and 
fervent periods, the difficult mask was 
Boon laid aside, and profound, undis- 
guised, devoted attention followed. In 



sighted, detected at times something the earlier part of his speech, one of his 

like exultation in his eye, he presumed principal opponents seemed deeply en- 
it sprang from the excitement of th< sed in the careful perusal of a n 

moment, and the anticipation of victory, paper he held before his face; but this, 

••The anxiety to hear the speech was on nearer approach, proved to be upside 

so intense, irrepressible, and universal, down. In truth, all, sooner or later, 

that no sooner bad the Vice-President voluntarily, or in spite of themse 

assumed the chair, than a motion was were wholly carried away bv the elc- 

made, and unanimously carried, to post- quence of the orator 



22 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



"One of the Laj»pu.^t retorts ever him — in which Col. Ha;. _ od-hu 
made in a forensic controversy, was hie moredly joined-' 



application of Hayne'a comparison of 
the ghost of the 'murdered coalition' 
to the ghost of Banquo : 

" ' Sir, the honorable member was not, 
for other reasons, entirely happy in his 
allusions to the story of Bauquo's mur 



'• As the orator carried out the moral 
of Macbeth, and proved by the exam- 
ple of that deep-thinking, intellectual, 
but insanely-ambitious character, how 
little of substantia] good or permanent 
power was to be secured by a devious 



der and Banquo's ghost. It was not, I land unblessed policy, he turned his eye 
think, the friends, but the enemies of with a significance of expression, full of 
the murdered Banquo, at whose bidding prophetic revelation, upon the Vice- 
his spirit would not down. The honor- President, reminding him that those who 
able gentleman is fresh in his reading of had foully removed Banquo, had p] 
the Bullish classics, and can put me ti . , . . 

right if I am r „ g ; but, according to £»Kfi*£*»*!K«-l ■—. 

my poor recollection, it was at those v.„„ n f tfieirs succeeding.' 

who had begun with caresses and ended 

with foul and treacherous murder, that Every eye of the whole audience fol 

the gory locks were shaken. The ghosted the direction pf his own — and wit- 

of Banquo, like that of Hamlet, was an nessed the changing countenance and 

honest ghost. It disturbed no innocent visible agitation of Mr. Calhoun 

man. It knew where its appearance 

would strike terror, and who would cry 

ont 'a ghost!' It made itself visible in 



'Surely, no prediction ever met a 

more rapid or fuller confirmation, even 

to the very manner in which the disaster 

the right quarter, and compelled the was accomplished. Within a lew : 



guilty and the conscience-smitten, and 
none others, to start, with, 

'sVythee, see therel behold I look! lo! 
If I stand here, 1 saw him !' 

Their eyeballs were scared (was it not so, 
Sir-:) who had thought to shield them- 
selves, by concealing their own hand. 
and laving the imputation of the crime 
on alow and hireling agency in wicked- 
ness ; W ho had vainly attempted to still' 
the workings of their own coward con- 
sciences, by ejaculating through white 
lips and chattering teeth, 'Thou can'sl 
not saj 1 did it .'" 1 have misread the 
great poet if those who had no waj par- 
taken in the deed of death, either found 
that they were, or feared that they 
thould be, pushed from their stools 1»\ 
the ghosi of the slain. ->r exclaimed, to a 
spectre created bj their own fears and 



months, the political fortunes of the 
Vice-President, at this moment seeming- 
ly on the very point of culmination, had 
sunk so low, there were none so poor to 
do him reveren< 

■• Whether for a moment a presenti- 
ment of the approaching crisis in his 
fate, forced upon bis mind by the man- 
iid language '.'i the speaker, cast a 
gloom over bis countenance, or some 
other cause, it i.> impossible to say ; but 
his brow grew dark, nor for some time 
did his feature- recover their usual im- 
passibility. 

"The allusion nettled him — ti 
as he c>uld not but witness the effect it 
produced upon others— ami made him 
restless. He seemed to seek an oppor- 
tunity t> break in upon the speaker; 
and "later in the day, as Mr. Webster 
was exposing the gross and ludicrous 
inconsistencies of South Carolina politi- 



their own remorse, 'AvauntJ and quit clans, upon the Bubject of internal im- 
our sight!' provementa, he interrupted him with 

"There was a smile of appreciation so me eagerness: 'Does the Chair un- 
upou the faces all around, at this most derstand the gentleman from Massachu- 
felicitou- use of another'- illustration— setta to Bay that the person now occu- 
thia turning one's own witness against pying the Chair of the Senate has 



Lift of /hi 11 i<{ Webster. 



23 



changed his opinions on tliis subject I 1 
To this, Mr. Webster replied imme- 
diately, and go»d:naturedly : 'From 

nothing ever said to me, Sir, have T had 
reason to know of any change in the 
opinions of the person filling the Chair 
of the Senate. If such change has taken 
place. I regret it.' 

"Tli.-' who had doubted Mr. Web- 
ster's ability to cope with and overcome 
his opponents were fully satisfied of their 
error before he had proceeded far in his 
speech. Their fears soon took another 
direction. When they heard his sen- 
tences of powerful thought, towering in 
accumulative grandeur, one above the 
otheT, as if the orator strove, Titan-like, 
to reach the very heavens themselves, 
they were giddy with an apprehension 
that he would break down in his flight. 
They dared not believe that genius, 
learning, any intellectual endowment 
however uncommon, that was simply 
mortal, could sustain itself long in a 
career seemingly so perilous. They 
feared an Icarian fall. 

" Ah ! who can ever forget, that was 
present to hear, the tremendous, the 
awful burst of eloquence with which 
the orator spoke of the Old Bay State ! 
or the tones of deep pathos in which the 
words were pronounced: 

"'Mr. President, I shall enter on no 
encomium upon Massachusetts. There 
she is — behold her, and judjr r for your- 
selves. There is her histoiy — the world 
knows it by heart. The past, at least, 
is secure. There is Boston, and Cqn- 
cord, and Lexington, and Bunker Hill 
— and there they will remain for ever. 
The bones of her sons, falling in the 
great struggle for independence, now lie 
mingled with the soil of every State, 
from New England to Georgia, and 
there they will lie for ever. And, sir, 
where American Liberty raised its first 
voice : and where its youth was nurtured 
and sustained, there it still lives, in the 
strength of its manhood and full of its 
original spirit. If discord and disunion 
shall wound it — if party strife and blind 
ambition shall hawk at and tear it — if 
folly and madness — if uneasiness, under 



salutary and necessary restraint — shall 
Bucceed to separate it from that T T nion 
by which alone its existence is made 
sure, it will stand, in the end, by the 
vide of that cradle in which its infancy 
was rooked; it will stretch forth its arm 
with whatever of vigor it may still ro 
tain, over the friends who gather round 
it ; and it will fall at last, if fall it must, 
amidst the proudest monuments of its 
own glory, and on the very spot of its 



origin. 



" What New England heart was there 
but throbbed with vehement, tumultu- 
ous, irrepressible emotion, as he dwelt 
upon New England sufferings, New 
England struggles, and New England 
triumphs during the war of the Revolu- 
tion ! There was scarcely a dry eye in 
the Senate; all hearts were overcome: 
grave judges and men grown old in dig- 
nified life turned aside their heads, to 
conceal the evidences of their emotion. 

"In one corner of the gallery was 
clustered a group of Massachusetts men. 
They had hung from the first moment 
upon the words of the speaker, with 
feelings variously but always warmly 
excited, deepening in intensity as lie 
proceeded. At first, while the orator 
was going through his exordium, they 
held their breath and hid their faces, 
mindful of the savage attack upon him 
and New England, and the fearful odds 
against him, her champion ; — as he 
y,ii!t deeper into his speech, they felt 
easier; when he turned Hayne's flank 
On Banquo's ghost, they breathed ' 
and deeper. But now, as he£lluded to 
Massachusetts, their feelings were strain- 
ed to the highest tension ; and when the 
orator, concluding his encomium upon 
the land of their birth, turned, inten- 
tionally or otherwise, hi- burning 
full upon them — they shed tears like 
girls ' 

"No one who was not present can 
understand the excitement of t 1 
No one, who was, can give an adequate 
description of it. No word-paintii 1 1 an 
convey the deep, intense enthusiasm, the 
rentaal attention, of the vast assem- 
bly — nor limner transfer to 



u 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



earnest, eager, awe-struck countenances, both sides of the water, hut I must con- 



Though language were as subtle and 
flexible as thought, it still would be im- 
possible to represent the full idea of the 
scene. There is something intangible in 
an emotion, which cannot be transferred 



I Dever heard anything which sc 
completely realized my* conception of 
what Demosthenes was when he de- 
livered the oration for the crown.' 
"Assuredly, Kean nor Kemble, nor 



The nicer shades of feeling elude pur- any other masterly delineator of the 
suit. Every description, therefore, of human passions ever produced a more 



the occasion, seems to the narrator him 
self most tame, spiritless, unjust." 

[The personal appearance of Mr. 
Webster has been a theme of frequent 
discussion. He was, at the time this 
speech was delivered, barely forty 



powerful impression upon an audience, 
or swayed so completely their hearts. 
This was acting — not to the life — but 
life itself. 

" No one ever looked the orator, as 
he did — ' os kumerosque (ho rimtiiif in 



eight years of age. Time had not thin- j form and feature how like a god. His 
ned nor bleached his hair : it was as dark countenance spake no less audibly than 
as the raven's plumage, surmounting his his words. His manner gave new force 
massive brow in ample folds. His eyes, to his language. As he stood swaying 
always dark and deep set, enkindled by his right arm, likea huge tilt-hammer, 
some glowing thought, shone from be- up and down, his swarthy countenance 
neath his sombre, overhanging brow lighted up with excitement, he appeared 
like lights, in the blackness of night, amid the smoke, the fire, the thunder 
from a sepulchre. It was such a conn- of his eloquence, like Vulcan, in his 
tenance as Salvator Kosa delighted to armory forging thoughts for the Go 

"The human <r wore an ex- 

than pression of more withering, relent 



paint. 
No 



one understood better 



Mr. Webster, the philosophy of dress Bcorn, than when the orator replied to 
— what a powerful auxiliary it is to Bayne's allusion to the ' murdered coa- 
speech and manner, when harmoniz- lition.' ' It is,' said Mr. W< ..' 'the 
ing with them. On this occasion he very cast-off slough of a polluted and 
appeared in a blue coat and buff vest — shameless press. Incapable of further 
the Revolutionary colors of buff and mischief, it lies in the sewer, lifeless and 
blue— with a white cravat ; — a costume, despised. It is not now, -ir, in the 
than which none is more becoming to power of the honorable member to give 
his face and expression. This courtly it dignity or decency, by attempting 
particularity of dress added no little to elevate it. and introduce it into the 
the influence of his manner and appear- senate. H< cannot change it from what 

it is — an object of general disgu.-t and 

Much bfthe instantaneous effect of scorn. < >u the contrary, the contact, if 
the speech arose, of course, from the he choose to touch it, i> more likely to 
orators deliver/— the tones of his voice, drag bim down, down to the place where 
his countenance, and manner. These it lies itself.' He looked, as he spoke 
die mosth with the occasion thai calls these words, as if the thing he allu 
thi m forth — the impression is losl in the to was too mean tor .-corn itself — and the 
attempt at transmission from one mind sharp, stinging enunciation made the 
I aother. They can only be described words still more withering. The audi- 

eneral terms. ' Of the effectiveness ence seemed relieved — bo crushing was 
of Mr. Webster's manner, in many the expression of his face which they 
parts,' says Mr. Everett, 'it would be in held on to, as it were, spellbound — 
vain to attempt to give anj oi vhen he turned to other to] 

present the faintest idea. It has been "The g l-natured yet provoking 

my fortune to hear Borne of the ablest irony with which he described the 
•p e< hi - of the greatest li\ ; n imaginary though life-like scene of direct 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



25 



collision between the marshalled array Many who had entered the hall with 
of South Carolina under Gen. Ilayne on light, gay thought*, anticipating at most 
one Bide, and the officers of the United U pleasurable excitement, soon became 
States on the other, nettled his opponent deeply interested in the speaker and his 
even more than his severer satire; it subject — surrendered him their entire 
seemed so ridiculously true, Col. Hayne 



inquired, with some degree of emotion, 
if the gentleman from Massachusetts 
intended any personal imputation by 
such remarks ? To which Mr. Webster 
replied, with perfect good humor, 'As- 
suredly not — just the reverse.' 

The variety of incident during the 
speech, and the rapid fluctuation of 
passions, kept the audience in continual 
expectation and ceaseless agitation. 
There was no chord of the heart the 
orator did not strike, as with a master 
hand. The speech was a complete 
drama of comic and pathetic scenes j one 
varied excitement; laughter and tears 
gaining alternate^victory.) 

''A great portion or the speech is 
strictly argumentative ; an exposition 



of constitutional law. But grave as such 
portion necessarily is, severely logical, 
abounding in no fancy or episode,lt en- 
grossed throughout the undivided men- 
tion of every intelligent hearer. Ab- 
stractions, under the glowing genius of 
the orator, acquired a beauty, a vitality, 
a power to thrill the blood and enkindle 
the affections, awakening into earnest 
activity many a dormant faculty. His 
ponderous syllables had an energy, a 
vehemence of meaning in them that 
fascinated, while they startledj His 
thoughts, in their statuesquet>eauty 
merely, would have gained all critical 
judgment ; but he realized the antique 
fable, and warmed the marble into lite. 
There was a sense of power in his lan- 
guage — of power withheld and bi 
tive of still greater power — that sub- 
dued, as by a spell of mystery, the hearts 
of all. For power, whether intellectual 
or physical, products in its earnest de- 
velopment a feeling closely allied to 
awe. It was never more felt than on 
^^js^ccasion. It had entire mastery. 
""The sex. which is said to love it best and 



heart ; and, when the speech was ov>-r, 
and they left the hall, it was with sadder 
perhaps, but, surely, with far more 
elevated and ennobling emotions. 

" The exulting rush of feeling with 
which he went through the peroration 
threw a glow over his countenance, like 
inspiration. Eye, brow, each feature, 
every line of the face seemed touched, 
as with a celestial fire. All gazed as at 
something more than human. 80 Moses 
might have appeared to the awe-struck 
Israelites as he emerged from the dark 
clouds and thick smoke of Sinai, his face 
all radiant with the breath of divinity. 

"The swell and roll of his voice struck 
upon the ears of the spell-bound au- 
dience, in deep and melodious cadence, 
as waves upon the shore of the ' far re- 
sounding ' sea. The Miltonic grandeur 
of his words was the tit expression of 
his thought, and raised his hearers up to 
his theme. His voice, exerted to its ut- 
most power, penetrated every recess and 
corner of the Senate — penetrated even 
the ante-rooms and stairways, as he pro- 
nounced in deepest tones of pat! 
words of solemn significance : ' When 
my eyes shall be turned to behold, for 
the last time, the sun in heaven, may I 
not see him shining on the broken and 
•nored fragments of a once glorious 
Union ; on States dissevered, discordant, 
belligerent! on a land rent with civil 
feud, or drenched, it may be, in frater- 
nal blood ! Let their last feeble and 
lingering glance rather behold the 
geous ensign of the Republic, now 
known and honored throughout the 
earth, still full high advanced, its arms 
and trophies streaming in their original 
lustre, not a stripe erased nor poll 
not a single star obscured, bearing for 
its motto no such miserable inter 
tory a-. ' What IS all this wort! 

those other wor ind folly, 



abuse it rnosj, seemed as much or more ' Liberty tir-t . and Union - la :' 

carried away than the sterner one. but everywhere, spread all over in 



26 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



•rs of living light, blazing on all its choice of expression. Not one of them 
ample folds, as they float over the sea but felt he had gained a personal vic- 
and over the land, and in every wind tory. Not one, who was not ready to 
under the whole heav.-ns, that other sen- exclaim, with gushing eyes, in the ful- 
timeut, dear to every American heart, n.-.-s of gratitude, 4 Thauk God, I too am 
Liberty and Union, now and forever, a Yanb 

one a,nd inseparable.' " In the evening General Jackson held 

"The speech was over, but the tones a levee at the White House. It was 
of the orator still lingered upon the ear, known, in advance, that Mr. "Webster 



and the audience, unconscious of the 
close, retained their positions. The agi- 
tated countenance, the heaving breast, 
the suffused eye, attested the continued 
influence of the spell upou them. Hands 
that in the excitement of the moment 
had sought each other, still remained 
closed in an unconscious grasp. Eye 
still turned to eye, to receive and repay 
mutual sympathy; and everywhere 
around seemed forgetfulness of all but 
the orator's presence and words. 

" When the Vice President, hastening 
to dissolve the spell, angrily called to 
order! order! there never was a deep- 
er stillness — not a movement, not a 
tup- had been made — not a whisper ut- 
I — ord.-r! Silence could almost 
have heard itself, it was so supernatu- 
rallv still. The feeling was too over- 
■ ring to allow expression by voice or 
hand. It was as if one was in a trance, 
all motion paralysi 

" But the descending hammer of the 
Chair awoke them, with a start — and 
with one universal, long-drawn, deep 
breath, with which the overcharged 
heart seeks relief, — the crowded a£ 
bly broke up and departed. 

"The New England men walked 
down Penn&j h ania avenue that day, after 
the speech, with a firmer step and bolder 
air — 'pride id their port, defiance in 

their eye.' You would have -worn they 

had grow n some in< hi a tall< r in a 
hour-' time. They di vour way in 

their stride. Tiny looked every one in were pi 
the face they met, fearing i xowd entei 

tion. Tiny swarmed in the sti 
having become miraculously multitudi- 
nous. Thej clustered in parties, and 
fought the scene over one hundred times 



would attend it, and hardly had the 
hospitable doors of the house been 
thrown open, when the crowd that had 
filled the Senate chamber in the morn- 
ing rushed in and occupied the rooms. 
Persons a little more tardy in arriving 
found it almost impossible to get in, 
such a crowd oppressed the entrance. 

" Before this evening General bad 
been the observed of all observers. His 
military and personal reputation, official 
position, gallant bearing, and courteous 
manners, had secured him great and 
merited popularity. BR -ns were 

always gladly attended by large numbers 
— to Avhom he was himself the object of 
attraction. 

"But on this occasion, the room in 
which he received his company wasde- 
>erted, as soon as courtesy to the P 
dent permitted. Mr. Webster, it was 
whispered, was in the east room, and 
thither the whole mass hurried. 

"He stood almost in the centre of the 
room, hemmed in by eager crowds, from 
whom there was no all pres 

to get nearer to him. He Beemed but 
little exhausted by the intellectual • 
tion of the day. as it had been. 

The flush of excitement still lingered and 
! upon his countena _ aud 

beautifying it like the Betting sun its ac- 
company ing clouds. 

•• \!1 w< re eagi r to gi I a sight at him. 
Som< 

mounted the chain of the room. Many 

to him. The dense 

and r*-t irii; _r- DH 

round him, renewing the ordeT of their 

d and egression, continually. 

< 'lie \v«.uld a^k his neighbor : ' Where — 

which is Webster! 1 — c There, don't you 



that night. Their elation was the great im — that dark, swarthy man. with 

ei by reaction. It knew no limit itdeep< beavyT>rov —that'i 






Life of Daniel Webster. 



27 



V 



Webster.' No one was obliged to make 
a second inquiry. 

" In another part of the room vi as 
Col. Hayne. lie, too, had his day of 
triumph, and received congratulations. 
His friends even now contended that the 
contest was but a drawn battle, no full 
victory having been achieved on either 
side. There was nothing in his own ap- 
pearance this evening to indicate the 
mortification of defeat. With others, he 
went up and complimented Mr. Webster 
on his brilliant effort ; and no one, igno- 
rant of the past struggle, could have sup- 
posed that they had of late been engaged 
in such fierce rivalry. It was said at the 
time, that, as Col. Hayne approached 
Mr. Webster to tender his congratula- 
tions, the latter accosted him with the 
usual courtesy, ' How are you this even- 
ing, Col. Hayne ?' and that Col. Hayne 
replied, good-humoredly, ' none Vie better 
for you, sir /' " 

The speech of Mr. Webster on this oc- 
casion is so familiar to the whole coun- 
try, and this extended extract gives so 
complete a picture of its general scope, 
that any more specific outline of it would 
rbe superfluous. In mere logic, it has 
often been surpassed : — but as a reply to 
a violent attack, — as a defence against a 
vehement and formidable assault, — and 
as combining all the various qualities 
which such an effort demands, it is un- 
rivalled in the forensic history of this 
country and has seldom been surpassed 
anywhere. As a masterpiece in this spe- 
cial department of eloquence, it deserves 
careful study;* and although a severe 
analysis of it may detract something 
from the popular estimate of its' charac- 
ter, as compared with the great speeches 
of the master orators of the world, it 
will only quicken the admiration which 
it deserves for felicity of retort, adroit- 
ness in turning the flanks of the attack- 
ing force,vthe logical consecutivem 
its historical statementsyand the grand, 
stately, imaginative eloquence of its rhe- 
torical pi ] . N-> one can read both 
bes without fc.-ling that Hayne's 
did not deserve such a reply ; and that 
the two athletes were most unequally 



matched. Col. Hayne replied to Mr. 
Webster, confining himself, however, to 
the single point of the rights of the Ge- 
neral Government under the Constitu- 
tion. Mr. Webster rejoined in a brief 
restatement of his argument : — but this 
restatement was in fact a reconstruction 
of it. He presented it now divested of 
all the incidental matter by which it had 
originally been embarrassed, and without 
any of the rhetorical attendants which 
had swollen its stateliness and rendered 
it far more impressive and imposing, but 
which nevertheless impaired its real 
strength. As an argument merely, we 
consider this second speech, brief and 
unpretending as it is, decidedly superior 
to the first, in the popularity of which, 
however, it has been completely over- 
shadowed. Mr. Webster's "great 
speech," as it is universally known,, pro- 
duced a great sensation throughout the 
country. It was widely circulated and 
universally read. The debate continued 
for some weeks, but the argument had 
been exhausted and the discussion was 
really at an end. Mr. Webster received 
from every quarter of the Union the 
most complimentary congratulations 
upon the result of the contest, and upon 
the service he had rendered the country. 
Massachusetts passed resolutions of 
thanks, and the example was followed 
by the Legislatures of several other 
States. Distinguished Southern gentle- 
men added 'the tribute of their praise. 

MR. WEBSTER AND NULLIFICATION. 

Mr. Webster continued to take an 
active part in the business and 
of the Senate throughout the adminis- 
tration of General Jackson and his im- 
mediate successor. This period of our 
history was marked by events of magni- 
tude and permanent importance. As 
the characteristic of General Jackson's 
mind was an indomitable will, so his 
administration was marked by an exalta- 
tion of the Executive at the expense of 
other department of the Govern- 
ment Whenever b< Mea- 
sure as desirable, the whole | . his 



28 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



commati'l, persona] and official, was di- 
rect. •<! to its enforcement. In one of 
his messages, indeed, in reply to objec- 
tions that the will of the people, as re- 
presented in Congress, should be para- 
mount in all cases of legislation, he ad- 
vanced the distinct claim that the popu- 
lar authority was in fact embodied in 
the President, as he was elected by a di- 
rect vote of all the people. This princi- 
ple, and the spirit which it indicated, be- 
gan to manifest themselves in various 
acts of the administration, and to arouse 
no slight degree of opposition to its ar- 
bitrary character throughout the country. 
General Jackson had been elected by 
. the union of various parties. Mr. Adams, 
hi- unsuccessful competitor, in a letter 
written in 1830, but which has but just 
been published, — it was given in the 
New York Daily Times of Oct. 22,-— 
ascribes his defeat to four distinct par- 
ties against him. "At the election of 
18'-' .3." he says, "there were four can- 
didates — three of whom were returned 
to the House of Representatives — be- 
sides a fifth, who had sunk by hi- own 
weight into tin- secondary rank of an as- 
pirant to the Vice-presidency, in which 
he succeeded for the moment by the 
ruin of his after-prospects, I believe for 

i \er. My el,'. -tioii was effected in the 

House by the junction of the fourth and 
excluded candidate's supporters with 
mine, and that operation produced the 
subsequent failure of my re-election, the 
triumphal elevation of my BUCCessor, and 
the irretrievable disappointment of him 

who had. a- a laM resource, linked his 
political fortunes with mine, but who. 
from that hour, was deserted and be- 
trayed by his own party. They gained 
the coalition of the three preceding dis- 
appointed candidal.-, and thus left m< 
at the election of L828, to my own soli- 
tary strength. That remained unim- 
paired, hut was unequal t<> the contest 
with the united power of the four par- 
combined against me, and I fell." 
It was scarcely possible that this union 
should long exist unimpaired after the 
i f.r which it had been formed, 
had brought responsibility to be in- 



curred, and duties to be performed. Mr. 
Calhoun, whose friendship had been in- 
dicated, if not purchased, by being elect- 
ed Vice-president, speedily found that 
he could have in that position no spe- 
cial influence or control in the govern- 
ment ; and the exclusion of all his 
friends from the Cabinet, and the ap- 
pointment as Secretary of State of Mr. 
Van Buren, who was Mr. Calhoun's ri- 
Ival for the succession, and as such fa- 
vored by General Jackson, completed 
the alienation. Private differences ag- 
gravated the quarrel, and it soon be. 
open and violent. Mr. Van Buren, dis- 
liking all elements of strife, resigned the 
| Secretary-hip, and accepted the mission 
to Kmdand. But while in office he 
had given Mr. McLane, then our minis- 
ter to the Court of St. James, instruc- 
tions to seek concessions in regard to 
our trade with the British colonies, and 
to represent, as an inducement to the 
British government to grant them, that 
the party which had come into power 
would be found more favorable to 
tain interests which Great Britain wished 
cure. When, therefore, his nomi- 
nation came before the Senate, its con- 
firmation was strongly opposed by Mr. 
Webster, who in this had the concur- 
rence of Mr. Calhoun ; and it was re- 
jected. 

In the twenty-second Congress the 
Bank question became prominent At 
the fn-st session (1831- 2), a hill had 
been introduced by Mr. Dallas, provid- 
ing for a re charter. Mr. Webster sup- 
ported the hill upon the ground that the 
bank was highly important to the fiscal 
operations of the government, and to the 
currency, exchange, and general business 
..f the country. The Presidenl had 
called the attention of Congress to the 
subject without intimating any doubts 

of the constitutionality of the hank. ' No 

Complaints had been made of its man- 
agement ; it was in good credit at home 
and abroad, and was generally popular 
a- an important agent in the financial 
operations of the country. The Presi- 
dent, however, had endeavored to con- 
trol the appointment of some vf tht 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



29 



officers in one of the eastern branches, 
and this attempt had been resisted. 
This difference created a feeling of hosti- 
lity and of mutual suspicion between the 
President and the bank, and led to that 
open warfare which convulsed the coun- 
try for some years. The bill passed both 
Houses and was vetoed by Gen. Jack- 
son. 

Meantime the interest in this subject 
was superseded by another of more 
pressing importance. In South Carolina 
discontent under the Tariff had greatly 
increased. Under the operation of the 
various protective tariffs which had been 
enacted with the concurrence and gene- 
rally under the lead of the South, a large 
manufacturing interest had grown up in 
the Northern and Central States, — while 
the South had not experienced similar 
benefits from them. Large tracts of 
new lands recently opened to settlement 
near the Mississippi, had drawn from the 
worn-out sections along the Atlantic 
great numbers of their people, and the 
injurious results of this process, as well 
as of other circumstances, were attributed 
to the tariff. Public resentment at the 
South had been thus turned against the 
principle of protection, and its constitu- 
tionality had been strongly denied. The 
feeling of discontent had led to the most 
hostile language, and Mr. Calhoun, with 
other leading men in the same section 
of the (Country, had distinctly asserted 
the right of any State to resist and nul- 
lify laws which she might consider un- 
constitutional or in violation of her 
rights. Mr. Webster had repeatedly 
met Mr. Calhoun in argument upon this 
question, ami had always maintained the 
supremacy of the Constitution and of the 
Supreme Court of the United States as 
the final interpreter of its provisions. In 
some of hia speeches, especially in one 
made on the 2Gth of January, 1830, Mr. 
Webster made a triumphant vindication 
of the position he had taken upon this 
subject. 

Gen. Jackson was, however, re-elected 
President in the fall of 1832; and the 
people of South Carolina were at once 
roused into the most intense excitement 



against the North and the protective 
policy. Public meetings were held 
throughout the State, and at a general 
convention, an Ordinance was adopted, 
declaring the unconstitutionality of the 
Tariff laws, and proclaiming the purpose 
of South Carolina to resist any attempt 
that might be made to collect taxes 
under them within the limits of that State. 
The Legislature, which met soon after, 
ratified the Ordinance ; declared the 
Tariff acts unconstitutional, null, and 
void ; directed the enrolment and enlist- 
ment of volunteers, and advised all the 
citizens to put themselves in military 
array. The whole State was in arms. 
Musters were held every day. Charles- 
ton looked like a military depot, and an 
immediate collision between the State 
and national forces was apprehended. 
Col. Ilayne resigned his seat in the 
United States Senate, and was elected 
Governor of South Carolina. Mr. Cal- 
houn resigned the Vice-Presidency, and 
succeeded Hayne in the Senate. Con- 
gress met early in December, and the 
vacant chair was filled by the election 
of Hugh L. White, of Tennessee, over 
John Tyler, of Virginia — White receiv- 
ing seventeen and Tyler fourteen votes. 
Mr. Calhoun had not arrived, and ru- 
mors were afloat that <Ien. Jackson had 
threatened to arrest him on his way, for 
treason against the government. What 
course, indeed, the President would take 
was not known, but it had been the to- 
pic of current rumor for some months 
previous. 

Mr. Webster, in October, had met the 
citizens of Massachusetts in a public 
meeting at Worcester, and had there 
rehearsed the dangers of the country, — 
reasserted the supremacy of tie- Consti- 
tution, and claimed for Congress the 
power of providing for the emergency. 
He raised his voice " beforehand, against 
the unauthorized employment of milita- 
ry power, and against suspending the 
authority of the laws, by an armed 
force, under the pretence of patting 
down nullification. Referring to a 
rumor of Gen. JackBon's intended action, 
which had been widely current, he said : 



30 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



"He 1 it lias no authority to 

blockade Charleston ; the President baa 

no authority to employ military force- 
till he .shall be duly required to do so 
by law and by the civil authority. His 
duty is to cause the laws to be executed. 
His dut] is to support the civil authori- 
ty. His duty is, if the laws be 
to employ the military force of the coun 



arms in their hands and cockades in 
their hats, ready to march to that city 
at a moment's notice ; and the moment 
Congr." -hall pass the laws recom- 
mended by the President in relation to 
our port, I will pour down a torrent of 
volunteers, that shall sweep the myrmi- 
dons of the tyrant from the soil of 
Carolina." Mr. Calhoun did not reach 



try. if necessary, for their support an.! Wu.-hington until January. ( >n the 4th 
execution: but to do all this in compli-lof that month he took his seat in the 
ance only with law and with decisions of Senate, received the congratulations of 
tribuna The course punned by the the members of that body, and, in the 

people of South Carolina roused the midst of a crowded and eager assembly, 
President from the inactivity which , took the oath to support the Constitu- 
had only concealed, but had not pre- tion of the United States. In a few 
vented, a vigilant preparation for the days he moved for a call upon the 
rising storm. Confidential orders were President for copies of the Proclama- 
issued to the officers of the army and tion, and of the counter Proclamation 
navy to hold themselves in readiness of Gov. Hayne. These were comrnuni- 
for active service. General Winfield cated by the President on the 16th of 
Scott was sent to Charleston, to take January; and on the "-'l-t the "J 
such steps as he might deem necessary Bill," a- it was called, " making further 
to preserve the authority of the Govern- provision for the collection of the reve- 
ment. Prudent and resolute men were nue," was reported by Mr. AYilkins, 
stationed at the proper posts : anus and from Pennsylvania, on behalf of the 
munitions of war were pr . and Judiciary Committee. It gave th 1 

due preparation was made fur all con- dent the largest powers over the men 
tingencies. On the I lth of December, and money of the nation, to put down 
1832, the President issued a Proclama- any armed resistance to t -nue 

tion, written by Mr. Edward Livingston, laws of the Unit - Upon this 

who had succeeded Mr. Van Buren as hill, and upon resolution's which he in- 
tary of State, from notes furnished traduced, embodying hi- _ .1 views 
by Gen. Jackson himself; and taking, on the right of a State to annul an 
substantially, the ground which Mr. stitutional laws of Congress, Mr. Cal- 
Webster had uniformly maintained in boun made, on the 15th and 16th of 
debate upon the Bubject A counter February, the ablest argumenl ever ad- 



Proclamation was at once issued by 
Governor Haute ; and laws were at 
passed by the Legislature for put- 
ting the Btate in a condition to earn- 
on war with the general Government 
United States troops were collected at 
various points ; and on the other side, 
the militia were drilled, muskets clean- 
ed, foreign officers t- ndered their 

- to the Governor, and everything 

indicated the speedy approach of civil 
war. At a large meeting of Nullifiers, 
held at Charleston, Col'. Preston, one of 
their leading men, sel forth the state of 
by declaring that " there wew 



vanced in Bupport of his position. The 
debate, previous to that tune, had 

shared by various senator-, and had 

been marked by various incidents. Mr. 

had maintained si!, i ■ • . 61 
in one or two instances, where he had 
thrown in a - in upon some inci- 

dental point Of this nature was a 
remark which ho made, when there 
seemed to be a general disposition to 
attack the bill, passing over the procltr 

:i. Mr. Webster di I should 

be known, once for all, " that this 
an administration measure ; that it is 

! resident's own measure : and I 



sixteen thousand back-countrymen with ] the 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



31 



goodness, if they call it hard names, and 
talk boldly against its friends, not to' 
overlook ita source. Let them attack 
it, if they choose to attack it, in its' 
origin." He had declined an invitation 
to speak upon the subject, so long as i 
Mr. Calhoun had kept silent, or so long J 
as the advantage in debate seemed to 
rest on the other side. But Mr. Cal- j 
Bonn's speech on this occasion called 
him out. 

Mr. Calhoun's speech was awaited 
with great anxiety, and heard with eager 
interest. He was considered, beyond 
the bounds of his own State and party, 
as a bold, bad man. An all-devouring, 
unscrupulous personal ambition was 
popularly supposed to have driven him 
into this position of a conspirator against 
the Constitution. He was daily de- 
nounced as John Catiline Calhoun, by 
the special organ of the President, the 
Globe, and by the people at large he 
was feared as such. His personal ap- 
pearance, as is remarked by the author 
already largely quoted, "answered well 
the preconceived idea of a conspirator. 
Tall, gaunt, and of a somewhat stooping 
figure, with a brow full, well-formed, but 
receding ; hair, not reposing on the 
head, but starting from it like the Gor- 
gon's ; a countenance, expressive of un- 
qualified intellect, the lines of which 
seemed deeply gullied by intense 
thought ; an eye that watched every- 
thing and revealed nothing, ever inqui- 
sitive, restless, and penetrating ; and a 
manner emphatic yet restrained, deter* 
mined but cautious ; persons who knew 
not his antecedents, nor his actual posi- 
tion, would have pointed him out as one 
that might meditate great and danger- 
ous pursuits. To an audience, already 
embittered, he seemed to realize the full 
idea of a conspirator." His speech was 
a masterpiece of direct, simple, una- 
dorned argumentation. It very far sur- 
passed, in every respect, the previous 
effort of Mr. Hayne. Its tone was that 
of injured innocence, — claiming always 
that Smith Carolina was the party 
wronged, repelling, with calm an>! 
rowful dignity, the imputations which 



had been thrown out against himself, 
lamenting plaintively the decay of fra- 
ternal feeling between different members 
of the Union, and sustaining by an ela- 
borate argument of great cogency the 
right of a State — not to resist the Con- 
stitution, not even to judge of the exer- 
cise by the general government of any 
power which it delegates — but to repu- 
diate utterly exery assumption of power 
not delegated, and to resist, as null and 
void, every law that may be passed 
under any such assumption. His speech 
extended through two days : — and he 
closed by challenging the opponents of 
his doctrine to disprove them, and 
warned them, in the concluding sen- 
tence, that the principles they might 
advance would be subjected to the revi- 
sion of posterity. 

Mr. Webster rose immediately and 
entered upon a reply. He bad been 
looked to, not only by his own political 
friends, but by the President and his 
party, as the champion upon whom 
would devolve the defence of the ground 
they had taken. The bill had received 
prompt modification, in several respects, 
upon his requirement, — and had thus 
been brought into more full conformity 
with the views he had expressed at \\ or- 
cester. His speech on this occasion is 
one of the best he ever made. Less 
showy, it is more logical, than his reply 
to Hayne, and although it produced a 
less powerful impression at the time 
upon the audience which heard it, it will 
be far more frequently referred to here- 
after for the argument it embodies. He 
stated the theory of Mr. Calhoun in a 
f.. -w brief sentences, stripping it of all the 
qualifications by which that master of 
language and of thought had concealed 
its real meaning. 

"Beginning with the original error, 
that the Constitution of tie CTl 
States is nothing but a compact between 
Sovereign States; a j in the next 

step, that each State fa 
its own sole judge of I f its 

own obligations, and, consequently, of 
the constitutionality of the laws of Con- 
gress, and in the next, that it may 



52 



Life of ])<t>a>l W'.bster. 



oppose whatever it sees fit to de 
unconstitutional, and that it decides for 

f on the mode and measure of 
redress, the argument arrives at once at 
the conclusion, that what a State dis- 
sents from, it may nullify ; what it op- 
poses, it may oppose by force; what it 
decides for itself it may execute by its 
own power ; and that, in short, it is 
itself Bupreme over the legislation of 
Congress, and supreme over the deci- 
sions of the national judicature — su- 
preme over the Constitution of the 
country — supreme over the supreme law 
of the" land. However it seeks to pro- 
tect itself against these plain inferences, 
by saying that an unconstitutional law 
is no law, and that it only opposes 
such laws as are unconstitutional, yet 
this does not, in the slightest degree, 
vary the result, since it insists on decid- 
ing this question for itself; and in oppo- 
sition to reason and argument, in oppo- 
sition to practice and experience, in op- 
tion to the judgment of others 
having an equal right to judge, it says 
only: 'Such is my opinion, and my 
opinion shall l>e my law, and I will sup- 
porl it by my dwn strong hand. I 
denounce the law. I declare it uncon- 
stitutional ; that is enough ; it shall 
not be executed. Men in arms are 
ready to resist its execution. An at- 
templ to enforce it shall cover the land 

with bl 1. Elsewhere, it may be bind- 

: but here, it is trampled under 
foot,' This, Sir, is practical nullifica- 
tion." 

Againsl these positions Mr. Webster 
laid down a Bystem embodied in the 
following propositions : 

'• I. That the Constitution of the 
United States is nol a league, confede- 
racy, or compact, between the people 
of tl ral States, in their • 

capacities; but a government proper, 
founded on the adoption of the people. 
and creating direel relations between 
itself and individuals. 

" II. That no State authority has 

power to dissolve those relations ; that 
nothing can dissolve them but revolu- 
tion; and that, consequently, then 



be no such thing as secession without 
hition. 

"III. That there is a supreme law, 
ting of the Constitution of the 
United States, acts of C passed 

in pursuance of it, and treaties; and 
that, in cases not capable of assuming 
the character of a suit in law or equity, 
Congress must judge of, and finally inter- 
thifl Bupreme law, so often as it has 
'on to p of legislation ; and 

in eases capable of assuming, and actu- 
ally assuming the character of a suit, 
the Supreme Court of the United States 
is the final interpreter. 

" IV. That an attempt by a State to 
abrogate, annul, or nullify an Act of 
Congress, or to arrest its operation 
within her limits, on the ground that, in' 
her opinion, such law is unconstitutional, 
is a direct usurpation on the just po 1 
of the genera] Government, and on the 
equal rights of i >ther States : a plain 
latioii of the Constitution, and a pro- 
ceeding essentially revolutionary in its 
character and tendency." 

These propositions were maintained 
with great ability, without any attempt 
at Barcasm, humor, or anything but 
simple argument. The opinion gene- 
rally entertained of its merit and con- 
clusiveness is well indicated in a V 
written to him very soon after its delivery, 
by Ex-President Madison, As Mr. 
Madison was largely concerned in draft- 
ing the famous resolutions of 1798, 
upon which the whole State Rights 
s _ nerally based, his opinion 
upon this Bubject was. and -till is, enti- 
tled to great weight.. We think, there- 
fore, that our readers will be glad to 
read his letter t,> Mr. Webster on that 
oocasion, which has hitherto been pub- 
lished only in Mr. Everett's biographical 
sketch prefixed to the r» tion of 

Mr. V. 

"MtWtftHtr, March 15, 1833. 

" My Db LB Sut : — 1 return my thanks, 
(be, for the copy of your late very | 
ert'ul Bpeech in the Senate of the United 
State-. It crashes 'nullification, 1 and 
must hasten an abandonment of 'eeeea- 



Life of Darnel H'< 



33 



sion.' Hut this dodges the blow- by 
confounding the claim to secede f.t will 
with the right of seceding from intolera- 
ble oppression. The former answers 
itself, being a violation without cause of 
a faith solemnly pledged. The latter is 
another nam:"' only for revolution, about 
which there is no theoretic controversy. 
Its double aspect, nevertheless, with the 
countenance received from certain quar- 
ters, is giving it a popular currency here, 
which may influence the approaching 
elections, both for Concre-s ami for the 



finally proclaims its supremacy, ami that 
cf tin' laws made in pursuance of it, 
over the constitutions and laws of the 
States, the powers of the government 
being exercised, as in other elective and 
responsible governments, under the con- 
trol of its constituents, the people and 
the legislatures of the States, and Bubject 
to the revolutionary rights of the people 
in extreme cases. 

" Such is the Constitution of the 
United States de jure and de facto, and 
the name, whatever it be, that may be 



Stale !. wislatute. It has gained some ' given to it, can make it nothing more or 
advantage, also, by 



mixing itself with 



the question whether the Constitution 
of the United States was formed by the 
people, or by the States, now under a 
theoretic discussion by animated parti- 
sans. 

" It is fortunate when disputed theo- 
ries can be decided by undisputed fai 
■ and here the undisputed fact is, that the 
Constitution was made by the people, 
but as embodied into the several States 
who were parties to it — therefore made 
by the States in their highest authorita- 
tive capacity. They might by the same 
authority, and by the same process, 
have converted the confederacy into a 
mere league, or treatv, or continued it 
with enlarged or abridged power; or 
have embodied the people of their re- 
spective States into one people, nation, 
or sovereignty ; or, as they did, by a 
mixed form, make them one people, 
nation, or sovereignty for certain pur- 
poses, and not so for others. 

"The Constitution of the United 
States, being established by a competent 
authority — by that of the sovereign peo- 
ple of the several States who were parties 
to it— it remains only to inquire what 
the Constitution i-, and here it -peaks for 
itself. It organizes a government into 

the usual legislative, executive, andjudi- suggestion, General Jackson was -trong 
ciary departments; invests it with Uy disposed to seefc an alliance with Mr. 



less than wdiat it is. 

" Pardon this hasty effusion, which, 
whether precisely according or not with 
} T our ideas, presents, I am aware, none 
that will be new to you. 

" With great esteem and cordial salu- 
tations. 

" James Madison." 
" Mr. Webster." 

The bill, as is well known, passed — 
with the vote of John Tyler alone, in the 
negative, its other opponents having, 
from various reasons, left the Senate 
chamber before the vote was taken. It 
is, of course, scarcely necessary to add, 
that Mr. Clay had taken no part in this 
great debate, having been anxiously and 
laboriously engaged in elaborating and 
preparing the way tor the Compromise, 
by which the dispute was at last adjust- 
ed. Mr. AVebster's course in this crisis, 
commanded the warm approbation of 
Gen. Jackson, wdio felt the extent of the 
service thus rendered to his administra- 
tion. He took an early opportunity, in 
person, to express his cordial gratitude 
for his support, and his Secretary of 
State, Mr. Livingston, repeatedly made 
similar acknowledgments. It has been 
alleged, that mainly at Mr. Livingston's 



specified powers, leaving others to the 
parties to the Constitution. It makes 
the government, like oth< r governments, 
to operate directly on the people ; places 
at its command the needful physical 
means of executing its powers; and 



Webster, founded upon the community 
of their principles upon this subject, 
which should extend to the whoi 
Qen. Jackson's administration. It is al- 
leged, on good authority, that Mr. 
Livingston, with the President's consent, 



34 



Lift of Daniel Wt 1 



consults! Mr. Webster upon the subject, been read by him at a Cabinet meeting 



and that a scat in the Cabinet was at 
the same time placed at his disposal. 
One fact bearing upon this subject, ia 
given by Mr. Marc!,, as upon authority. 
II' states that a distinguished Senator, 
apolitical and personal friend of 
Jackson, brought to Mr. Webster a list 
of intended nominees for office in the 
Eastern States, and asked him to erase 
therefrom the nam.- of any who might 
be personally objectionable to him. This 
he declined to do, from an unwillingness 
to place bimself under any obligation to 
the Administration, which might at all 
interfere with the freedom of his action, 
ue can avoid speculating as to the 



in regard to the removal of the deposits 
on the 18th of September, lie sup- 
ported the resolution in an aiiin. 

h, and it was adopted by a vote of 
23 to 18 — the State-Bights men, on this 

don, abandoning Gen. Jackson, and 
leaving the Administration in a minority. 
The President, in reply toth< .tion, 

declared his independence of the Senate, 
as a coordinate branch of the Govern- 
ment; and he "had yet to learn under 
what constituted authority that branch 
of the Legislature had a right to require 
of him an account of any communica- 
tion, either verbally or in writing, made 
to the heads of 1 lepartments in Cabinet 



different political fortunes which might! Council." He therefore declined to 



have overtaken the country, had th 
stem energy of Gen. Jackson, and the 

profound wisdom of Mr. Webster, 
united in directing its destiny. 

THE BANK pONTBOVERST. 

The next great topic which enlisted 
public attl ution was well calculated — 
and its introduction, by the leadei 
the democratic party, it has been 
charged, was designed — to render any 
such cooperation between these two 
commanding spirits out of the question. 
Mr. Webster, at the close of the session, 
made a Bhort journey to the Middle and 
Western States. He was 
everywhere with the most distinguished 
attention, being greeted by public meet- 
ings in all the principal cities, and 
making at various points addresses upon 
topics of public interest. Gen. Jackson 
als.. made a Northern t<>ur during the 
same re© bs of I Songress : and it was 
during that period that the removal of 
the public deposits from the Bank of 
the 1 united States was determined on. 
It was carried into effect in September, 
1888, and its immediate effect upon the 
business of the country was most disas- 
trous. Congress met two months after; 
and one of the earliest movements in 
the Senate was the offering of a n 
tion by Mr. Clay, calling on the Presi 
dent for a copy of a paper said to have 



comply with the request contained in 
the resolution. In the paper thus called 
for he had declared that he had decided 

upon the measure in question, and 
should carry it into effect upon his own 
responsibility, and without requiring any 
member of his Qabinet to make any 
sacrifice of opinion or of principle. For 
this he was severely denounced by the 
< Opposition. Mr. Clay offered resolutions 

of substantial censure, and supported 

them in one <■'{' the ablest speeches he 

ever made. After a long and vehement 

debate, the resolution-, considerably 
modified by their author, passed the S 
ate — one of them by a vote ^>( 26 to 20, 

and the other 28 to 18. In the dis- 

cussion upon these resolutions, Mr, v. 
ster took no part But in reply to them, 
General .lack-on sent to the "Sena; 
the 17th of April, L 834, his memorable 
Protest, in which he argued with great 
ability, 1st that the Executive, under 
the constitution and the laws, b the sole 
custodian of the public funds ; 2dly, that 
even on the supposition that be had 
a— unied an illegal power, he was ame- 
nable to the action of either House, only 
through the constitutional process y( 
impeachment; Sdly, that the President 
alone is responsible to the people ah.no 
for the conduct of all the subordinate 
Executive others, while they in turn are 
responsible only to him ; and 4thly, that 
. rect, immediate representa- 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



35 



tive of the people. This formidable 
document, and the claim it preferred to 
the most extraordinary powers, aroused 
profound sensation, not only in the 
Senate, but throughout (he country. 

On the 7th of May, Mr. Webster de- 
livered a speech upon the subject, in 
which he subjected every portion of that 
remarkable paper to the severest examina- 
tion. At the opening and the close of his 
remarks he took occasion to disavow, in 
the most earnest manner, everything like 
personal or partisan feeling against the 
President, a man who, he said, " has ren- 
dered most distinguished services to his 
country, and whose honesty of motive and 
integrity of purpose are still maintained 
by those who admit that his adminis- 
tration has fallen into lamentable errors." 
But he regarded the doctrines of the 
Protest as at Avar with all sound prin- 
ciples of constitutional liberty, and as 
indicating a tendency on the part of the 
Executive towards a despotic usurpation 
of powers belonging to other depart- 
ments, which called for the most prompt 
and determined resistance. Even if no 
harm should result from the claim, still 
it ought not to be allowed to pass un- 
challenged. " It was against the recital 
of an act of Parliament, rather than 
against any suffering under its enact- 
ment, that our fathers took up arms. 
They went to war against a preamble. 
They fought seven years against a de- 
claration." Upon this question of prin- 
ciple, " while suffering was yet afar off, 
they raised their flag against a power to 
which, for purposes of foreign conquest 
and Bubjugation, Rome, in the height of 
her glory, is not to be compared ; — a 
power which has dotted the surface of 
the whole globe with her possessions 
and military poets, whose morning 
drum-beat, following the sun, and keep- 
ing company with the hours, circles the 
earth with one continuous and unbrok- 
en strain of the martial airs of England." 
— Mr. Webster asserted and vindicated, 
in the clearest mamver, not only the 
right, but the duty, of the Senate, to de- 
fend the public liberty against encroach- 
ment, and to express its opinions when- 



ever it believed such encroachment to 
hare taken place. The Senate had aoted 
in its legislative, and not in its judicial 
rapacity, and in this action it had only 
defended its own just authority and that 
of the co-ordinate I » ranch of the Legisla- 
ture. He examined closely, and de- 
nounced with majestic emphasis, the ex- 
traordinary doctrines put forward by the 
President concerning the theory of his 
relations to the other branches of the 
Government, and to the people, — de- 
claring that if these doctrines were true, 
it was "idle to talk any longer about 
any such thing as a government of laws. 
We have no government of laws — we 
have no legal responsibility. We have 
an Executive, consisting of one person, 
wielding all official power, and responsi- 
ble only as Cromwell was responsible 
when he broke up Parliament, or Boua- 
parte when he dissolved the Assembly 
of France." The speech elicited the 
warmest commendations from distin- 
guished men in every section of the 
country. Chancellor Kent exhausted 
the language of eulogy in extolling its 
merits.. Governor Tazewell, of Virginia, 
who had seldom concurred with Mr. 
Webster in his views upon public topics, 
thanked him cordially, and declared that 
1 he agreed with him throughout. Dur- 
I ing the same session Mr. Webster made 
frequent speeches upon various topics of 
interest, as they arose in the course of 
business, and wrote also a very able re- 
port on the Finances, on behalf of the 
committee of which he was a member. 
In 1835 he spoke at length upon the 
French Spoliation bill ; — the power of 
removal from and appointments to office, 
insisting that the President could not 
rightfully remove from office without 
the consent of the Senate ; and upon re- 
solutions proposed by Mr. Benton, pro- 
viding for the national defence, and 
especially upon the action the President 
had taken to secure their favorable con- 
sideration. He also drew up and pre- 
Bented a Protect against the action of the 
Senate in adopting amotion to expunge 
from its records the resolutions by 
which, in 1834, it had expressed its 



36 



IAft of Dane I W'tbster. 



disapprobation of the Presidents course 
in removing the deposits. 

In November, 1836, Mr. Van Buren 
was elected President, to succeed Gen. 
Jackson. During that winter, although 
lurrency question and others, which 
had grown out of it, continued to occupy 
the attention of Congress and the coun- 
try, and although Mr. Webster spoke 
frequently upon them a> they came up 
for discussion, no great topic called for 
special effort. In February he accepted 
an invitation from a very large number 
of merchants, professional men and 
others in the city of New York, to at- 
tend a large public meeting. His speech, 
delivered on this occasion in Niblo's Sa- 
loon, on the 15th of March, 1837, em- 
braced a comprehensive view of all the 
measures by which Gen. Jackson's ad- 
ministration had been distinguished. He 
spoke at length of the Tariff, Internal 
Improvements, Arc, and called the atten- 
tion of the country to the movements 
which were on foot for the annexation 
of Texas to the United States. He 
declared his opposition to that measure, 
mainly on account of his "entire un- 
willingness to do anything that should 
extend the Slavery of the African race, 
on this Continent, or add other Slave- 
holding States to this Union." But the 
main part of his speech related to the 
action of the Administration in regard 
to the financial condition of the country. 
After the adjournment of Congress, Mr. 
iter made a rapid tour through the 
Western State.-, in the course of which 
he was greeted by the most cordial wel- 
come "ii the part of the people, and ad- 
dressed large] stings a1 \\ . Va.. 

Madison, End., and other places. 

President Van Buren came into office 
on the 4th of March, 1837. < toe of bis 
first acta was to call an extra session of 
I fongress, \s bich mel in S | ruber, to 
provide for she iib emergencies 

created by the almost simultaneous sus- 
pension of Bpecie payment- by the 
hanks throughout the Country, in the 

month of May. At the meeting of Con- 
is, the Independent Treasury Systo m 
brought forward by the Adminis- 



tration, which proposed to dispense alto- 
gether with the aid of banks, to provide 
a distinct set of officers to take ch a _ 
of the public money, and to exact specie 
in payment of all public due-. Mr. 
-ter opposed the whole system, as 
impracticable and certain to prove in 
the highest degree injurious t<» the in- 
teresta of the country. In a long and 
speech at that session, he set forth 
his view of the duties of the Get 
irnment in regard to the Curp 
The measure did not pass at the Extra 

ion. 
At the next regular se.-sion, on the 
•JTth of December, Mr. falhoun offered 
a resolution against the interference of 
Congress with slavery in the lhstriet of 
Columbia, declaring that it would be a 
" direct and dangerous attack on the 
in>titutions of all the slawhdlding 
States." To this Mr. (lay. on the loth 
of January, 1838, offered a substitute, 
declaring that such interference would 
"be a violation of the faith implied in 
the cessions by the States of Virginia 
and Maryland, a just cause i>\' alarm to 
the people of the slaveholding S 
and have a direct and inevitable 
dency to disturb and endanger the 
Union." Mr. "Webster opposed I 
upon the ground that he could see 
nothing in the act of Bessi a, nothing in 
the Constitution, and nothing in the 
history of this or any other transaction, 
implying any limitation upon the ] i 
of Congress to exercise exclusive juris- 
diction over the ceded territory in all 

- whatsoever. 
On the 16th of January, a bill was 
introduced into the Senate by Mr. 
Wright, to establish the Independent 
Treasury system, which came up for its 
Becond reading on the 80th. Mr. 
Wright, in advocating the passage of 
the bill, had taken ground against the 
allegation that Congress had anything 
to do with providing a currency for the 
people. " bet the Government," 
be, " attend t" it- own business, and let 
the people attend, t<> theirs, bet the 
Government take care that it secures a 
sound currency for its own use and let 



' / of Daniel Webster. 



37 



it leave all the rest to the States and to 
the people." These " ominous sen- 
tences" were the key-note of the speech 
which Mr. Webster made in opposition 
to the bill on the next day. He de- 
nounced the sentiment which they 
expressed as utterly unbecoming a Re- 
publican Government, and opposed the 
bill as in the highest degree injurious to 
the public interest. On the 15th of 
February, Mr. Calhoun, who had, at the 
extra session, intimated his purpose to 
support the Sub-Treasury Bill, and had 
issued a letter to his constituents upon 
the subject during the recess, replied to 
Mr. Webster. This elicited from Mr. 
Webster, on the 12th of March, another 
speech on the same subject, much more 
elaborate and complete than the first. 
He discussed at length the relations of 
capital and labor in this country, the 
uses of the credit system, the progress 
of the country in agriculture, commerce, 
and manufactures, and the extent to 
which this progress was due to the sys- 
tem of credit, and the absolute necessity 
to both the Government and the people 
of a sound Bank paper currency. He 
vindicated, by constitutional exposition, 
and by recurrence to history, the right 
of the Government to use banks in the 
custody and transmission of its Funds, 
and pointed out the disastrous conse- 
quence which could not but result from 
the introduction of s<> different a system 
as that which the bill in <juestion pro- 
posed to establish. He closed by refer- 
ring to the speech of Mr. Calhoun, and 
by a very sharp examination of the 
course of that gentleman during his 
public career. On this and other ques- 
tions of public interest, Mr. Calhoun 
replied on the 22d of March, and spoke 
disparagingly of Mr. Webster's course 
during the last war with fireat Britain. 
Mr. Webster rejoined at once, with force 
and effect. 

In the spring of 1839, Mr. Webster 
visited Europe, for the first and only 
time in his life, making a hasty tour 
through England, Scotland, and Franc.'. 
He was received with marked attention 
and with every mark of the most dis 



tinguished consideration. II" attended 
several public festivals, and among them 
the first Triennial celebration of the 
Royal Agricultural Society at Oxford, 
on the 18th of July. He gave special 
attention during his tour to the condi- 
tion of Agriculture, to the subject of 
Currency, and to the condition of the 
laboring classes; and the resull of his 
study of these subjects is traceable in 
many of his subsequent speech' 

Previous to his departure, Mr. Webster 
had prepared a letter to the Whig Na- 
tional Convention which assembled dur- 
ing his absence, withdrawing his name 
as a candidate for the Presidencv. Gen. 
Harrison was nominated, and after a 
few weeks the whole country became 
intensely agitated with the contest be- 
tween him and Mr. Van Buren. Mr. 
Webster returned home before the elec- 
tion, and took an active part in the 
contest. The derangements in the cur- 
rency, the depression of labor which had 
resulted, the apprehensions entertained 
of the effect of the Sub-Treasury system 
upon the industry of the country, and 
other circumstances, laid the basis for a 
more exciting political canvass than the 
country has ever witnessed before or 
since. At Saratoga, on the 10th of 
Aug. 1840, Mr. Webster addressed an 
immense meeting upon these Bubj 
and other issues involved in the coi 
I >n the 10th of Sept. he presided over a 
va-t concourse of people assembled at 
Bunker Ball, and read a declaration of 
" Whig Principles and Purposes," which 
he bad drawn up for the occasion. On 
the 28th of Sept. he made a speech from 
the steps of the Exchange in Wall 
New York, principally upon the 
financial issues involved. And on tin- 
5th of Oct he made a \'-ry eloquent 
address upon the general subject at 
Richmond, Virginia. All these spe< 
were marked by Mr. W< 
teristics, strong r< asonii ■/. the uti 
felicity of language, and tl I im- 

posing grandeur of manner and of style. 

With the result tin untrv id familiar. 

1 I [arrison v. ident by 

an overwh timing p pular majority, and 



38 



Life of Daniel Webtter. 









cami' Into office on the 4th of March, 
1841. 

MR. WVB8TSB A3 SECRETARY OF STATE. 

The inauguration of Gen. Harrison, in 
1841, was the inauguration of a new era 
in the life of Mr. Webster. Mr. Clay, 
his great competitor in the political race, 
had distanced him in diplomatic honors. 
The treaty of Ghent had added the fame 
of the negotiator to that of the promising 
orator and statesman, which the colossal 
Kentuckian had been fortunate enough 
to secure in the first stages of his career. 
Mr. Webster had graduated in every 
other department of statesmanship ; had 
appropriated the highest reward of re- 
splendent success at the bar and in the 
forum ; had won the just renown of pa- 
triotism; proved equal to the preservation 
of the Union at an imminent crisis ; and 
indeed thoroughly matured his reputa- 
tion, before he proceeded to still higher 
exhibitions of his extraordinary powers. 
The remaining chapters of his biography 
form a perfect record of the most import- 
ant events In the history of the national 
diplomacy down to the period of the 
statesman's death. In the formation of 
his cabinet, Gen. Harrison was prompted 
not only by his personal predilections, 
but by the obvious sense of a large sec- 
tion of the Whig party, to make Mr. 
Webster the nucleus. The Treasury de- 
partmenl was accordingly tendered to 
that gentleman, but he declined it, inti- 
mating at the same time his readiness to 
accept the Department of State. Not- 
withstanding the enormous responsibility 
devolving upon the former office, in con- 
sequence of the universal expectation thai 
relief for the monetary distresses of the 

Country was U) emanate from that cjiiar- 

ter, it was no consideration of indolence 

; Mr. Webster to prefer the 

latter. Our foreign relations were as 

>adl\ deranged as the finances. Mr. 
Van Buren's administration, bo far from 
contributing to their adjustment, had, bj 
pursuing the dei ious and hyper-cautious 
policy, which uniformh marked it. 
wrapped them in almost hopeless confu- 



sion. To a majority of the questioi 
quiring immediate attention. < Meat Bri- 
tain was a party. Some of these diffi- 
culties were of a chronic nature; of 
others the symptoms were acute. The 
Northern Boundary had been the sub- 
ject of controversy for nearlv half a cen- 
tury. The treaty of 1783 had left it in- 
volved in obscurity. A convention en- 
tered into in 1793, had determined a 
small portion of the line, viz. that 
reaching from the Atlantic to the head 
waters of the St. Croix, but the remain- 
der was as unknown as the wilderness 
through which it pass* d. Another Con- 
vention, ten years later, prosecuted the 
subject further, by endeavouring to rix the 
whole boundary as far as the Rocky 
Mountains; but the acquisition of Lou- 
isiana gendering our government doubt- 
ful about the extent of its rights at the 
westward, the negotiation was broken 
off, until some explorations might be 
made. The matter stood thus until the 
Treaty of Ghent, when it was agreed to 
appoint a joint Commissioner to survey 
the line, and in case of any disag 
ment, to .-elect an arbitrator, wl 
cision should be final. The Burvey v. as 
made, and so was the Report There 
was disagreement, and while Mr. Clay 
was Secretary <^\ State, in 1^21. the 
question was submitted to the arbitra- 
ment of Hi- Majesty the King of the 
Netherlands. That potentate reported 

in 1831 : and his report was a- un-atis- 

factoiy to the Cabinet of Washington as 
to that of St. James. The parties 

to disagree; and w<' need not be sur- 
prised that, surrounded as it was with 
financial embarrassments and internal 

difficulties, which its own headlong po- 
licy bad created, the Administration of 
Gen. Jackson found no time to pro< 

with the calendar ol'unfinished business, 

A long and desultory correspondence 
between Mr. Forsyth, Secretary of State 
under Mr. Nan I'.uren. and Mr. Fox, the 
British Envoy, only augmented the 
trouble. Lord Palmerston, then Foi 
Secretary, was characteristically vexa 
tious and difficult. Proposition aftei 
proposition emanated alternately from 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



39 



either government, always involving the 

notion of tedious surveys, ;m<l no less 
tedious arbitrations; but the plan of 
neither suited the other, and they occu- 
pied the relations of two divergent orbs, 
to use Mr. Webster's own simile, which 
had to travel the whole circle before they 
could again meet. Such was the state 
of the whole subject when it descended 
to the administration of Gen. Harrison, 
bitterly aggravated, however, by the im- 
patience and jealousy which had sprung 
up among the residents upon the de- 
batable territory. Hostilities were daily 
expeeted; and the Legislature of Maine 
had even gone so far as to provide for 
the arming and equipment of a large 
military force, disguised by the name of 
a " civil- posse," to defend the supposed 
American frontier. No other than the 
most energetic action on the part of the 
Federal Government could prevent hos- 
tilities. 

The Oregon frontier was also the 
subject of much anxiety, as the territory 
was rapidly filling with settlers. Much 
ill feeling prevailed at the frequent visits 
to which American vessels, on the coast 
of Africa, were subjected by British 
cruisers, under pretence of ascertaining 
their innocence of the Slave trade. The 
case of Alexander McLeod, arising out 
of the seizure of the Caroline, in 1837, 
had, like everything else of real impor- 
tance, remained unhandled by Mr. Van 
Buren's Cabinet. In fact, a point in our 
external relations had been reached, 
when immediate negotiation was the 
alternative of war. Our Minister to 
London entertained so lively a sense of 
the danger, as to notify the Commander 
of our fleet, in the Mediterranean, of the 
probable approach of hostilities. 

Mr. Webster found himself face to 
face with these preSMng question-, when 
he entered upon his duties. He grap- 
pled with them at once. The case of 
Alexander McLeod was laid before him, 
in an urgent letter from Mr. Fox, on the 

12th of March, 1841. Mel 1 was 

about to stand a trial for his life before 
the State Courts of New York, upon a 
cbarjre of murder. The British Govern- 



ment avowed the seizure of the Caroline 
as an official act, thereby relieving any 
individual Berving under it-- flag on that 
occasion of any criminal charge, and de- 
manded the release of McLeod. Had 
he been executed, there is no doubt that 
war would have ensued. Mr. Webster, 
acknowledging the justice of the demand, 
but unable to interfere with the legal tri- 
bunals of an individual State, notified 
Mr. Fox of his desire to assist in the 
liberation of the prisoner, and Mr. Crit- 
tenden, then as now Attorney General, 
was dispatched to New York to assist in 
the defence. A verdict of acquittal solved 
the whole difficulty. 

Earlv in the summer of 1841, Mr. 
Webster reopened the question of the 
North-Eastern Boundary, by inviting 
the British government to negotiate upon 
the new basis of a conventional line. 
The proposition was received at London 
at the moment when the Melbourne Mi- 
nistry was about to relinquish office ; and 
it met with no response until the follow- 
ing December, when Lord Aberdeen, 
Foreign Secretary in the Cabinet of Sir 
Robert Peel, acquainted Mr. Everett, our 
minister at St. James, with the intention 
of Her Majesty's Government to send a 
special envoy to the United States, in 
order to adjust all unsettled questions. 
Lord Ashburton, the agent selected, was 
recommended not only by his acquain- 
tance with American character and 
affairs, but by his personal friendship for. 
Mr. Webster, formed during the visit of 
the latter to England, in ^1839. Lord 
Ashburton arrived in Washington in 
April, 1842. Mr. Webster had already 
applied to the governments of Maine 
and Massachusetts to appoint roinmis- 
sioners who should participate in and 
sanction the negotiation ; and the ques- 
tion, with all the collateral issues, was 
at once entered upon. 

The State papers which einan 
from Mr. Webster in the course, of this 
transaction, are among the most m 
lv productions of American intellect 
They embrace the whole rationale of 
the subjects they successively treat. 
stated in terms so lucid, and with judg- 



40 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



ment so correct, as to form a new era in 
the history of International law. The 
treaty, itself, undoubtedly accomplished 
all that could he accomplished at the 
time. Lord A-diburton was not prepared 
to enter upon the subject of the Or< 
boundary; and that was the only ques- 
tion which the Convention left unsettled. 
The boundary upon the North-east was 
fixed on the basis pf a Conventional 
lme, approved by the Commissioners of 
Maine and Massachusetts, the parties 
more immediately interested. The 
Right of Search was disfranchised ; and 
as a substitute, both nations engage. 1 to 
sustain sufficient squadrons on the Afri- 
can coast, to repress the slave-trade. An 
agreement for the reciprocal surrender 
of fugitives from justice was framed ; 
and the minor questions, relating to the 
capture of the Carolinr, and the ease of 
the Creole, were the subject of highly 
satisfactory correspondence, which has 
effectually prevented, and will alwa- 
was imagined, discourage a recurrence 
of similar transactions. The labors of 
the negotiators were terminated on the 
nth of Aug.. L842, and two days after, 
tin' treaty was laid before the Senate. 
The Committee upon Foreign Relations, 
of which Hon. William C. Rives was 
Chairman, reported it on the 15th, 
without amendment; and on the 20th, 
th>' Senate assented to the treaty, una- 
mended, by a vote of Yeas 39, Nays 9. 
Among the affirmative votes, we find 
the uames of Messrs. J. C. Calhoun, 
Rufus < Ihoate, John M. ( Ilayton, John J. 
Crittenden, George Evans, William R, 
Kin . W. P. Mangum, William C. Pres- 
ton, W. C. Rives, V P. Tallmadge, 
Silas Wright, Levi Woodbury. In the 

live, tl n'\ notable names were 

those of Messrs. Benton and Buchanan. 
The treaty of Washington, the ratifi- 
cations of which were presently after- 
wards exchanged In London, cli 
with the most remarkable State papers 
of the time. The quintuple treaty be- 
tween the five great powers for the sup- 
pression >■( the slave trade, which was 
signed in I >■•■•.. 1841, fell to the ground, 
"m t 1 : | *tions 



tained in the American document. 
clause relative to the surrender of 
fugitives, has been reproduced in several 
conventions framed for that specific pur* 
pose, between the various states of 
Europe. Disputes of tedious duration 
were laid to rest by it ; others exeiti: 
an extravagant popular feeling, M 
promising to end in an ill-timed resort 
to arms, were for ever quieted. It is to 
be regretted that several points, which 
Mr. Webster deemed satisfactorily ad- 
justed by the correspondence between 
himself and Lord Aehburton, had not 
been more definitively secured by articles 
in the treaty. The seizure of the Caro- 
line, and the treatment of the crew of 
the Creole, both involved questions of 
international right, in which the honor 
of our flag was deeply interested. 
Lord Ashburton, it is true. ed the 

irregularity of those acts ; and so long 
as the correspondence is remembered, it 
may prevent any repetition. But there 
would have been a stronger assurance, if 
the treaty itself had embodied the un- 
derstanding. It was, of course, the 
policy of Lord Palmerston and the Bi s 
lish opposition, to denounce the treaty. 
as sacrificing the interests of Great 
Britain. The subject led to an animated 
debate in the House of Commons, 
and the Ministry sustained a - 

shock in the encounter. Bnt the Whigs 
failed to prevent its ratification. At 

home and abroad, Mr. Webster was at 
mice recognized as one of the foremi 
diplomatists of the day. His reputation 
became a European one; and it the ex- 
pression of satisfaction- throughout this 
country was |ess vivacious than might 
have been anticipated, the fact most 

anted for by the unpopularity of 
the administration with which he was 
connected; Gen. EWrrison having diedj 
and been succeeded by John Tyler 

within a month after his inauguration. 

While th<" negotiations with Lord 

Ashburton were pending, other external 

questions divided the attention of the 

tate. • ( ur relations with 

Mexico were precarious. While on the 

hand our government was pressing 






Life of Daniel Webster. 



41 



tin- liberation of Bevera] Ajnerican citi- 
zens, whomad attended the unfortunate 
Texan expedition against Santa Fe, 
the Government of Mexico appealed to 
that of Washington to repress the 
southern emigration to Texas, which 
swelled the armies of the Republic to an 
extent, which threatened not only to 
make the conquest impossible for the 
largest force Mexico could raise, but to 
expose that confederation to invasion 
and dissolution. The correspondence 
of Mr. Webster with Gen. Waddy 
Thompson, then Envoy at the City of 
Mexico, and with Sig. de Bocanegra, 
the Mexican Foreign Secretary, embraces 
a clear and eloquent statement of the 
rights and duties of the two nations 
under such circumstances. The Mexican 
Minister was less respectful in the tone 
of his communications than was fitting 
the dignity of our Government, and Mr. 
Webster closed the correspondence with 
a reiterated averment of our entire neu- 
trality, and an expression of unwilling- 
ness to have any further intercourse 
upon the subject. At the same time, 
the case of the Spanish brig Amistad 
remained unsettled on the files of the 
Department, where it had been left by 
the previous administration. The vessel 
had been found by one of our home 
squadron, lying close to the American 
coast, and in the possession of a band 
of negroes, who had murdered the 
officers, and were too unskilful to man- 
age the ship. It was brought into port 
and a claim for salvage stated against 
it. While the matter was in this pos- 
ture, the Chevalier d'Argaiz, the Span- 
ish Minister, addressed the Secretary of 
State, protesting against the reference 
of the case to the Courts, when, as he 
maintained, it should be treated by the 
Executive, as relating directly to treaty 
obligations. This letter led to prolong- 
ed correspondence, in which Mr. Web- 
ster defended the course pursued bv his 
Government, so successfully as to silence, ' 
If not satisfy, the Spanish Envoy. And 
as a portion of the diplomatic history 
of the period, we must not omit mention ' 
of the admirable instructions add* 



to Mr. Caleb Gushing, when that gentle- 

man \va> about to embark on the deli- 
eat.- mission of opening relations with 
China; nor the correspondence with 
the Portuguese Envoy, upon the subject 
of duties upon foreign wines. In 
both of these papers, relatively unim- 
portant as they undoubtedly are, the 
extensive information, and comprehen- 
sive views of the statesman, were 
brought into vivid relief. 

As completing the history of this era 
of American politics, we are obliged to 
refer to two magnificent displays of his 
rhetorical powers, which Mr. Webster, 
the orator, felt called upon to make on 
behalf of Mr. Webster, the statesman. 
Returning, after the arduous duties of 
the summer, to enjoy a few weeks of 
relaxation at Marshfield, be was obliged 
to listen to a pressing invitation from his 
Boston admirers, that he should address 
them publicly on the foreign and do- 
mestic policy of the country. The dis- 
course was delivered to a crowded 
audience, in Faneuil Hall, on the 22d 
of September, 1842. It is needless to 
say, that it traversed the whole ground 
with masterly skill, distinctness, and 
compactness of expression, and that the 
recent negotiations received that lumi- 
nous exposition and earnest vindication, 
which was less needed perhaps in Massa- 
chusetts than elsewhere, where the sub- 
ject was less familiarly understood. 
Partisan bitterness, however, denied the 
question any rest from controversy. It 
was agitated among other electioneering 
elements in the canvass of 1844. and in 
184G, when in the Senate, Mr. Wei 
found bis political opponents unsparing 
of their objections against the Tr 
In April, of that year, he took occasion 
to address the Senate in justification of 
that measure. Mr. Charles Jared In- 
gersoll, a member of the House of 
Representatives from Pennsylvania, hao 
made the treaty, and the Americas 
negotiator, the topic of virulent diatri 

• that body, never allowing hi* 
arguments to fall short where a ready 
calumny was at hand to piece them out 
Messrs. Dix and Dickinson, I - iton 



42 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



from New York, also attacked the I-.- 
■ tarv ; the hitter in an elaborate 
speech, to which, when published, a re- 
hash of Mr. [ngersoll's godless inventions 
wan found to be appended. The reply 
of Mr. Webster will always rank among 
the most splendid and characteristic pro- 
ductions of his miml. Reviewing the 
history of the difficulties adjusted by the 
treaty, he scored the Democratic party 
thoroughly for the remissness which 
bad left them for the administration of 
Mr. Tyler to settle; and having amply 
vindicated that settlement beyond the 
possibility of further cavil, he turned 
upon his assailants, and exhausted upon 
them the stores of his indignant elocu- 
tion. Mr. [ngersoll received the full 
weight of the charge. Never was such 
a scathing torrent of contempt, ridicule, 
sarcasm, and vituperation, poured out 
upon an individual head. Clearing 
away with a rapid hand the sheltering 
falsehoods beneath which the Pennsyl- 
vanian had concealed himself, the orator 
held him up naked to the world, and 
tortured him with all the sharp weapons 
which the armories of rhetoric -^ l • ] > [ • I \- to 
a just indignation. Mr. Jnger.-oll, who 
had been more or less in public lifi 
the forty preceding years, disappeared 
after this castigation. He "has since 
confine. 1 himself to domestic ami pro- 
fessiona] a — < nations. 

But Mr. Webster's connection with 
the cabinet of Mr. Tyler, was never re- 
deemed from censure by the - 
his negotiations. Mr. Tyler had been in 
office hut a short t i 1 1 1 1 * when it began to 
be apparent that his administration 
would not 1m- conducted in a mam 
command tin- undivided Bupport <■>( the 
party which had raised him to power. 
While in the Senate, timing the great 
controversy bet* ite rights and the 

federal government, be had « ispo used 
the cause of Mr. Calhoun, and had . 
in general harmony with his views. Hi- 
course then had prevented his enjoying 
the t'nil confidence of the Wh 
later daj ; and bis accession to the 
put his fidelity to the 
Mr. < lay look an early oppor- 



tunity to introduce a bill for the charter 
of a national hank. A ver^ large por- 
tion of the Whig party, during the can- 
vass, had strenuously resisted the endea- 
vor to present the bank as a measure to 
which the party should be considered 
pledged. The utter ruin which had 
overtaken th>- old Bank of the United 
States, and the conviction that during 
the latter years of its existence, it bad, 
by mismanagement and corrupt prac- 
tices, richly deserved the universal odium 
with which its memory was covered, had 
led them to foresee the unpopularity 
which any attempt to create a new one 
would inevitably incur. But in spite of 
this distrust, the overwhelming parlia- 
mentary and party strength of Mr. Clay 
enabled him to carry the bill trium- 
phantly through Congress, and it was 
presented to President Tyler for his 
signature. This was withheld, and the 
bill was . Mr. Clay at once de- 

nounced th<- l'i. sident to the indignation 
of his party, and a whirlwind of oblo- 
quy and detestation was at once aroused, 
before which a much stronger .-pint than 
President Tyler's would ha\ forced 

to bend. Mr. Webster, who was not free 
from suspicion that persona] ambition on 
the part of Mr. Clay had quite as much 
to do with this crusadi ird for the 

public good, with more courage than 
succ.-.-- endeavored to breast the storm. 
lb was earnesl and unremitting in his 
efforts to bring the Whigs into a more 
tolerant and compliant mood. At a 
gathering of the leading Whigs of C. .n- 
36, had at hi- own house, b< .ly 

urged upon them the folly of throwii 

away all the results of the great popul 
victory they had gained because thi 
ha.l been disappointed in a single in. :i- 

-ure, and that, too. one of liable 

necessity and expediency, lb- efforts 
were unavailing. The thunder <•( Mr. 
Clay's denunciations drowned hi- tones 
of remonstrance — the whole Whig senti- 
ment >>( the country Bwaj indent 
to hi- tempestuous wrath. Mr. Web- 
Mel'.- colleagues in the cabinet indignant- 
ly tendered their resignations, hurl 
the President, as they left, the moat ■ lis- 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



43 



honoring charges of party faithlessness 
and personal falsehood. 

Strong in tlif conviction of the recti- 
tude of his own purposes, unwilling to 
yield to what be deemed a transient 
ebullition of popular feeling, and pro- 
foundly penetrated by the importance of 
pending negotiations with foreign pow- 
ers, Mr. Webster determined, against the 
most resolute entreaties of his political 
friends, to retain his seat, and he did so 
retain it for about two years. For this 
he was severely censured by the great 
body of the Whig party, and especially 
by the adherents of Mr. Clay, who were 
not over charitable in the construction 
they put upon his motives, or in the epi- 
thets they applied to his conduct. During 
his continuance in office, a State Con- 
vention of the Whigs of Massachusetts 
assembled in Boston, to nominate candi- 
dates for Governor and Lieutenant Go- 
vernor, at the State election. Hon. Ab- 
bott Lawrence presided over its delibe- 
rations, and a series of resolutions were 
adopted, expressing in strong terms dis- 
approbation of the course of Mr. Tyler, 
and declaring, on behalf of the Whigs 
of Massachusetts, a " full and final sepa- 
ration from the President of the United 
States." Not long afterwards, Mr. Web- 
ster, being on a visit to Boston, was ten- 
dered by the Whigs, many of whom had 
been prominent in the convention, the 
compliment of a public dinner. He de- 
clined the dinner, but expressed a wil- 
lingness to meet his fellow citizens at 
Faneuil Hall. The meeting was ap- 
pointed for September 30, and was at- 
tended by an immense concourse of Un- 
people of Boston. Hon. Jonathan Chap- 
man, Mayor of the city, presided ; and' 
upon presenting Mr. Webster to the 
assembly, addressed him with eloquent 
compliments for his public services, but 
with special allusion to what he styled 
the "pointed meaning of the occasion." 
He thanked him for the honorable atti- 
tude in which, ''so far as his department 
was concerned, he had placed his coun- 
try before the world. We are sure," 
said he, " whatever may befall the coun- 
try, that you will be ready to sacrifice 



everything for her good, save &onor, and 

on that point, amidst the perplexities of 
these perplexing times, we shall be at 
ease ; for we know that he who has so 
nobly maintained his country's honor 
may safely be entrusted with his own." 
Mr. Webster opened his reply with one 
of those exquisitely beautiful sentences 
which are scattered so profusely through- 
out his speeches. " I know not how it 
is, Mr. Mayor," said he, " but there is 
something in the echoes of these walls, 
or in this sea of upturned faces which I 
behold before me, or in the genius that 
always hovers over this, place, fanning 
ardent and patriotic feeling by every 
motion of its wings — I know not how it 
is, but there is something that excites 
me strangely, deeply, before I even begin 
to speak." Recurring then to the his- 
tory of his life, to his labors in their 
midst, and to his public services in the 
various positions he had been called to 
fill ; after a clear, condensed statement 
of the diplomatic labors in which he had 
been engaged, he referred directly to the 
remark of the Mayor, that he might be 
safely entrusted to take care of his own 
honor and reputation. " I am," said he, 
" exactly of his opinion. I am quite of 
opinion that, on a question touching my 
own honor and character, as I am to 
bear the consequences of the decision, I 
had a great deal better be trusted to 
make it. No man feels more highly the 
advantage of the advice of friends than 
1 do ; but on-a question so delicate and 
important as that, I like to choose my- 
Belf the friends who are to give me ad- 
vice ; and upon this subject, gentlemen, 
I shall leave you as enlightened 
found you." With this rather unpro- 
mising preface, he proceeded to remark 
upon the "outpouring of wrath" to 
which he had been subjected for remain- 
ing in the President's ( labinet He was 
"a little hard to coax, but as I 
driven, that was out of the question.* 
He had chosen to trust to his own j 
inent. and thinking he wa- pOflft 

where hewas in the service of the coun- 
try and could do it good, he had stayed 
there. 



44 



Life of Daniel Wtbster. 



Again apologizing for entering upon 
topics "ii which his opinions might be 
different from those of his audience, he 
cited the resolutions passed " by the most 
respectable Convention of Whig dele- 
gates," which had met in Boston a few 
- hefore. He noticed among them a 
declaration, made OQ behalf of the Whigs 
of the State, a "full and final separation 
fit< 'in the President." Whigs had a right 
to speak their individual sentiments 
everywhere; but whether they might 
assume to -peak for others on a point on 
which those others had given them no 
authority, is another question. "I am 
a Whig," said he; "I have always been 
a Whig, and I always will be one; and 
if there are any who would turn me out 
of the pale of that communion, let them 
see "who will get out first. I am ready 
to submit to all decisions of Whig con- 
ventions on subjects on which they are 
authorized to make decisions. But it is 
quite another question, whether a set of 
gentlemen, however respectable they 
may be as individuals, shall have the 
Dower to bind me on matters which I 
have not agreed to submit to their deci- 
sion." He went on to say that three 
years of the President's term of office 
still remained ; that great public inter- 
ests required his attention; and asked 
whether all his measures upon these sub- 
, however useful they might be, were 
t" be opposed by the Whig party of 
Massachusetts, right or wrong. There 
were a great many Massachusetts Whigs 
also in office— Collectors, District Attor- 
neys, Postmasters, Marshals. Whal was 
come of them in this separation '. 
Mr. Everett, our Minister in England, 
was In expei ted to come home on this 

separation, and yield his place to some- 
body else! "And in regard to the in- 
dividual who addi u — w hat do 

his brother Whigs mean to do w ith him I 
Where do they mean to place me I 
Generally, when a divorce takes place, 

the parties divide their children. I am 

anxionsto know where, in the case of this 

divorce, / shall fall." Mr. W< : 

he had alluded to this matter because he 
could nol fail to see that the resolution 



had an intentional or an unintentional 
( bearing on his position. It meant that 
if he should choose to remain in the 
I President's councils, lie must cease k> be 
a Massachusetts Whig. " And I am 
' quite ready," said he, " to put that ques- 
tion to the people of Massachusetts." 
He proceeded to say that there was too 
general a disposition to postpone all at- 
tempts to do good to the country to 
( some future day. Many Whigs thought 
they saw a prospect of having more 
power than they then had. But* there 
was a Whig majority in Congress, and 
the substantial fruits of the great victory 
of 1840 could, with moderate and pru- 
dent councils, still be secured. But 
nothing but cordial and fraternal union 
ci mid save the party from renewed pros- 
tration. 

Mr. Webster's speech on this occasion 
was one of great power, and it produced 
an effect upon the sentiment of the coun- 
try. But it could not turn back the tide 
Of indignant public feeling which had 
been turned at the outset, by the bold 
impetuosity of Mr. ''lay and the second- 
ing efforts of the retiring secretaries, 
against the President, Be gradually 
took ground against the party which had 
driven him out, and after an imbecile 
endeavor to purchase a renomination 
from the party to which he had deserted, 
became its open ally and subservient tool. 

Mr. Webster resigned office in 1842, and 
remained in private life during the re- 
mainder of the administration. He was 
succeeded by Mr. Calhoun, who «> 
lected by the President for the special 
purpose of carrying forward the am 
ation.of Texas, a measure which lie had 
been led to espouse with great ear' 
aess, though the Bteps towards its ao- 
complishmenl were as yet concealed from 
the knowledge of the country. Mr. 
Webster, on leaving office, end. ai 

to arouse public attention to the dai 
that were impending from this quarter; 
but his efforts were not attended with 
marked success. It was only upon the 
f another Presidential contest that 
the question assumed its just proportions 
in the public eye. 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



45 



During his retirement from oflice 
much of Mr. Webster's attention was 
engaged in professional pursuits, and the 
year 1844 was marked by several bril- 
liant exhibitions of his popular and 
forensic oratory. Two arguments, the 
one before the Supreme Court of the 
United States, and the other before that 
of Massachusetts, are in his very hap- 
piest vein. The first was delivered in 
February, in the case of F. F. Vidal and 
others vs. the Executors of the will of 
Stephen Girard, — a case in which pro- 
perty to the value of millions was in- 
volved. The main ground taken by 
Mr. Webster, on behalf of the heirs, 
against the validity of the will, was that 
the College at Philadelphia, endowed 
by the will, was not* a charity, because 
established on atheistical principles, and 
therefore not entitled to the protection 
of the laws. This proposition was sup- 
ported with all the aids of learning and 
ingenuity ; and on American soil no 
more eloquent vindication of religion 
and its ministers has ever been uttered. 
The speech, in a pamphlet form, was 
circulated extensively among the reli- 
gious world. It remains among the 
host of evidences he has left us, of the 
wide scope and infinite diversity of his 
talents, and the respect he always enter- 
tained for the institutions of religion. 
The argument at Boston, in the case of 
the Providence Railroad Company 
against the City of Boston, is from its 
nature, a strictly legal effort, and there- 
fore requires no especial notice here. In 
June, of 1844, the anniversary of the 
battle of Bunker Hill and the comple- 
tion of the monument were celebrated 
with much 6clat at Boston. The speech 
of Mr. Webster, who had baptized the 
first stone of the column with a stream 
of eloquence that shall remain classic 
while the monument and the language 
endure, was exceedingly appropriate, 
and though lacking the fire and imagi- 
native splendor of his earlier efforts, 
abounds with passages of remarkable 
vigor and beauty. 

The Presidential canvass of 1844 
opened by the nomination of Mr. Clay, 



by acclamation, in the Whig Conven- 
tion at Baltimore. Mr. Webster 1 , being 
in that city at the time, nitade a speech 
indicating his earnest desire for the 
triumph of the Whig party and its 
principles. Mr. Van Buren, in a long 
letter written just upon the eve of the 
Democratic Convention, had taken 
ground decidedly against the annexation 
of Texas. For this offence, among 
others, he had been set aside as a candi- 
date, and Mr. Polk was nominated for 
the Presidency. Mr. Clay had also 
taken ground against annexation ; and 
the canvass was conducted, to a very 
great extent, in all sections of the coun- 
try, upon' this issue. Mr. Webster made 
several .public addresses upon the sub- 
ject. At Albany, Philadelphia, and 
elsewhere, he spoke to large assemblies 
of people, though in all cases he gave 
attention mainly to questions relating to 
the commercial, financial, and industrial 
interests of the country. There is 
abundant reason to believe that if Mr. 
Clay had been content with his first 
declaration of opinion upon the subject. 
of annexation, he would have been 
elected. Subsequent explanations, made 
to remove anticipated objections to his 
position in Alabama, and other Southern 
States, deprived him, to a great extent, 
of the benefit which that position gave 
him at the North.' 

At the opening of the Congress of 
1845, Mr. Webster resumed his seat in 
the Senate, having been chosen to suc- 
ceed Mr. Choate. He found under dis- 
cussion some of the gravest questions 
that have ever agitated the country. The 
Oregon Boundary, and the result of 
Texan Annexation, were urgent; and 
popular feeling had been worked up to 
an extraordinary pitch of excitement 
about both. The Democratic Platform 
had declared in favor of ultra measures. 
It only remained for the Whigs, in 
Senate and House, to play the moderate 
role of a minority, and as tar as possible 
restrain the violence that threatened to 
bring on our heads two war-, for either 
of which we were totally unprepared, at 
the same hapless moment. The Tariff Bill 



46 



Life or' Da nil Wei 



of 1842 was likewise in imminent dan- 
ger; and in every point of view, the 

are of the party in relation t<> the 
conduct of both the external and inter- 
nal policy of the Government, was dis- 
tressing and difficult. Mr. Webster was 
of course found in the van of the mi- 
nority. Upon the Oregon question, he 
maintained the line of adjustment to 
which the Administration and its sup- 
porters were finally obliged to descend. 
Having opposed the Annexation resolu- 
tions, he was of course opposed to the 
precipitate measures by which we were 
plunged into the war with Mexico. And 
on the Tariff bill, he occupied the position 
he had always occupied, by defending 
the Whig policy to the very last. Of 
the eminently judicious policy of the 
Whigs with regard to the prosecution 
of tlie war. Mr. Webster deserves the 
credit. While protesting against the 
measure in its origin and progress, they 
patriotically sustained the Administ ra- 
tion with the most liberal supplies, and 
facilitated every approach to the only 
term then attainable, an honorable and 
remunerative pe 

The settlement of the Oregon Boun- 
dary dispute, winch bad existed for 
many years, was effected during the first 
year of Mr. Polk's administration, by an 
amicable division of the territory to 
which both England and the United 

ea laid claim. A bill was promptly 

introduced and passed the Bouse of Re- 
presentatives to organize a government 

for the territory thus acquired. When 
it reached the Senate, it was amended, 
by making the Missouri Compromise a 
part of it — excluding Slavery above, and 
admitting it below, the parallel of 36° 
30' north latitude. This amendment 
was disagreed to in the Souse; and 
when the bill came back, a long discus- 
sion was had upon a motion thai the 

Senate should recede. < Ml the L2th of 

August, 1848, Mr. Webster spoke in 
favor of the motion, insisting upon the 
right of Congress to exclude Slavery 
from this territory, upon the expe- 
diency of exercising that right, upon the 
ground of the complaint on the 



part of the South that their p r op e rty 
was excluded, and against any further 
extension of slave territory. Upon the 
question of extending Southern property, 
he said the whole complaint was simplv 
this: "The Southern States have pecu- 
liar laws, and by those laws there is pro- 
perty in slaves. This is purely local. 
The real meaning, then, of Southern 
evntlemen, in making this complaint, is 4 
that they cannot go into the territories 
of the United States carrying with them 
their own peculiar local law — a law 
which creates property in persons. This 
demand I, for one, shall resb- ." He 
closed his remarks by laying down three 
propositions : 

"First. That when this Constitution 
was adopted, nobody looked for any 
new acquisition of territory to be formed 
into slaveholdinir - 

"Second. That the principles of the 
Constitution prohibited, and were in- 
tended to prohibit, and should be con- 
strued to prohibit, all interference of the 
general Government with Slavery, 
existed, and as it still exists, in the 
States. And, 

"Third. Looking to the operation of 
these new acquisitions, which have in 
this great degree had the effect of 
strengthening that interest in the South 
by the addition tffiw States. T feel that 
there is nothing unjust, nothing of 
which any honest man can complain, if 
he is intelligent ; I feel that there is 
nothing with which the civilixed world, 
if they tak>- notice of so humble a per- 
son as myself, will reproach me when 1 
Bay, a^ 1 said the other day, that 1 have 
made up my mind for one, that under 
no circumstances will 1 consent to the 
further extension of the area of slavery 
in the United States, or to the further 
increase of slave representation in the 
1 1 Mise of Etepresentatu 

The Senate linally receded from its 
amendment, and the bill passed with a 
clause for ever excluding slavery from 
the territory — in which form it received 
the signature of the President 

In the Spring of lsiT. Mr. We 1 
visited the Southern States, pa- 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



47 



rapidly tli rough Virginia and North 
Carolina to South Carolina. At 
Charleston, he was honored by a com- 
plimentary dinner from the New-Eng- 
land Society of that city, and similar 
hospitalities were paid him at Columbia, 
Augusta, and Savannah. He designed 
"•"in"- to New Orleans, but ill-health 
compelled him to return. 

The Mexican war meantime had been 
prosecuted, by the skill and valor of the 
American arms, to a triumphant close. 
The capital and all the principal posts 
of the country were in our possession, 
and a treaty had been concluded by 
which Mexico ceded to us immense por- 
tions of her territory, comprising all of 
New Mexico and a large part of Califor- 
nia. Mr. Webster, on the 22d of March, 
1848, opposed the treaty, on the ground 
that it brought with it large accessions 
of territory which we did not need, 
which would only add new "Slave States 
to the Union, which would bring in 
new States of comparatively small popu- 
lation, and thus vastly augment the 
power of the Senate over that of the 
House of Representatives, and thus 
destroy the just relation between the 
two, and prove in every way injurious 
to the country. " I think," said he, " I 
see a course adopted which is likely to 
turn the Constitution of the land into a 
deformed monster — into a curse rather 
than a blessing ; in fact, a frame of an 
unequal government, not founded on 
popular representation, not founded on 
equality, but on the grossest inequality ; 
and I think that this process will go on, 
or that there is danger that it will go 
on, until this Union shall fall to pieces. 
I resist it, to-day and always. Whoever 
falters or whoever flies, I continue the 
contest !" The treaty was ratified. 
New Mexico and California became 
parts of the United States; and the 
great question thence arising, to be sub- 
mitted to the issues of a Presidential 
canvass, related to the nature of the 
territorial government under which they 
should be organized. The House in- 
sisted on the exclusion of slavery. The 
Senate resisted it; and between the two 






the whole question was left unsettled, 

and military power alone kept the terri- 
tories from a state of anarchy. 

The Democratic National Convention 
nominated General Cass for the Presi- 
dency, greatly to the disgust of the 
friends of Mr. Van Buren. The Whig 
Convention met at Philadelphia and 
nominated General Taylor. Mr. Web- 
ster declined to be a candidate for the 
Vice Presidency, declaring himself a 
candidate for the first office, and his 
purpose to remain so until the represen- 
tatives of the Whig party should decide 
otherwise. He was dissatisfied with the 
nomination of Gen. Taylor, partly be- 
cause he was opposed to making Presi- 
dents of military men, and partly be- 
cause he believed that the condition 
of the country required the selection of 
a Northern man, known to be true in 
resisting the steady aggressions of 
slavery. The result led him to despair 
of ever seeing the North united; and 
when the professedly exclusive friends 
of freedom in the territories selected Mr. 
Van Buren as their candidate and repre- 
sentative, he was inclined to abandon 
all further hope of making any success- 
ful stand against the domination of the 
slave-holding States. Falling back, 
therefore, upon the other issues which 
had divided the two political parties, he 
gave his support to the Whig candi- 
date ; taking care to say that it was not 
because he believed him to be the most 
fit and proper person for that position, 
but because he believed his election 
would be far better for the country than 
that of Gen. Cass. Gen. Taylor was 
elected. 

Meantime, the people of California, 
getting no government from Congress, 
made one for themselves. They met in 
State Convention, and formed a consti- 
tution, in which slavery was prohibited. 
This constitution \ epted by the 

people at an election held for the pur- 
pose. President Taylor came into 
-ffice on the 4th of March, 1840. Ow- 
ing to a misunderstanding between 
them, growing out of i tal circum 

stances, which involved blame upon 



48 



Life of Daniel Wtbster. 



neither side, there were no confidential 
tionfl between die President and Mr. 
Webster. In the House of Representa- 
tives, the Ami proviso was in- 
sisted on as an essential feature of any 
government for the territories that might 
be passed. This position was sustained 
by resolutions in all the non-slsveholding 
states, by large public meetings, and by 
Northern sentiment generally. The 
South felt highly indignant at these 
attempts to exclude slavery from the 
new territories, A meeting of a ma- 
jority of the members of Congress from 
slaveholding States was held at the 
Capital, at which Mr. Calhoun was 
appointed to draw np an address of the 
South. tii delegates to their constituents. 
The address thus prepared was after- 
wards adopted, and received the signa- 
ture- of forty-eight members of Congress 
from South. tii States. These move- 
ments led to a veTy considerable excite- 
ment throughout the country, though 
neither the Btate of public feeling, nor 
the movements of any portion of the 

j pie, were as hostile or menacing to 

the peace of the country as had been 
witnessed on previous occasions of our 
history. Mr. Clay had presented a 
Beries of propositions, five in number, 
which were designed to Be embodied in 
a ringie act, and to constitute one mea- 
sure for compromising and adjusting the 
difficulty. President Taylor was under- 
stood to be in favor of a. -ting upon .-acli 
separately, and on its merits, doing 
whatever justice should dictate, and 
trusting to the attachment of the peo- 
ple, and the rigor of the power- with 
which the Constitution clothes the Go- 
vernment, to pjev.-nt any serious results, 
lie wtm in favor of admitting California 
with the Constitution which the people 

had tiaiii.d. and <>f leasing the territo- 

to settle the question of admitting 
or excluding Blavery for themselves. 
Deputations of Southern members 
Congress waited upon him, with earnest 
remonstrances and equally earnesl me- 
naces; but neither shook his convic- 
tions nor disturbed bis purposes. The 
compromise measure of Mr, Clav fail- 



ed to command the assent of < 
gress, 

On the 7th of March, Mr. Webster 
made an extended and impressive v\ 

upon the whole subject, intended to pre- 
sent a bask upon which all sections 
could consent to stand, and by which all 
future collision- might be avoided, lie 
proposed, as practical measure-, nearly 
the plan of the President* namely the 
admission of California, and the organi- 
zation of Territorial Governments for 
Xeu -Mexico and Utah, without any ex- 
cluding clause — urging that -u 
clause would, in this e super- 

fluous. But he indicated a willini 
to purchase the claim of Texas to a por- 
tion of New-Mexico, which the Presi- 
dent proposed to submit to the adjudi- 
cation of the Supreme Court, and made 
sundry declarations of his own : 
sentiments, indicating a strong dispo- 
sition to make all pot 
Southern demands, for the sake of pre* 
serving the peace and stability of the 
I uion. Hi- -pcech on this occasion 
was exceedingly able, and awakened a 
degree of public interest fully equal to 
that of any of his previous efl 
Connected, to some extent, with these 
measures, was a bill amending the law 
of 1793 for the recovery of fugitive 
slaves, so as to make it mo tuaL 

It was originally introduced by Mr. 

Mason, of Virginia, and received Mr. 

Webster's support, although he had pre- 
pared and designed to offer an amend- 
ment, securing to persons claimed as 
fugitives the benefit of a trial by jury, 
to test the question whether the_\ owed 

-er\ i.e to th.ir claimants. 

We have good reason for belie-. 

that Mr. \\ . biter at this time had ; 

disabused of erroneous impri that 

had led. as previously stated, to a partial 
estrangement between himself and the 
President] and that he had cine to re- 
gard Gen. Tayloi a- the man best fitted 
by position, and by his views, to carry 
ountry safely through the crisis. 
This, however, belongs to the secret his- 
tory of those important events, and the 
time for writing that, — even if we w . p 






Life of Daniel Webster. 



49 



competent and possessed of the requisite 
material,— has not yet come. It is suf- 
ficient to say that if Gen. Taylor had 
lived, Mr. Webster would have been the 
acknowledged leader of the Administra- 
tion in the 8enate, and that affairs would 
undoubtedly have taken a different 
course. At this juncture, however, Gen. 
Taylor died, and Mr. Fillmore, then Vice- 
President, succeeded to the office. Mr. 
Webster was at once called by him, and 
by the voice of the country, to the post 
which he occupied at the time of his 
decease. The office was no longer op- 
pressed with those burdens of unfinished 
business, which had encumbered it at 
the end of Mr. Van Buren's term. But 
it had nevertheless its share of peculiar 
responsibilities. The administration of 
Mr. Fillmore was required to Enforce 
with the whole weight of its exalted 
influence the conditions of the Compro- 
mise, which were speedily enacted into 
laws. Some of those conditions offended 
the moral feelings and prejudices 01 one 
section of the Union : and the other 
pressed all the more eagerly for their 
Telentless fulfilment. To no portions of 
the country were the Compromise mea- 
sures more distasteful than to New- 
England, and to Mr. Webster's own 
State. The Secretary nevertheless did 
not hesitate to lend the whole strength 
of his popularity and of his intellectual 
resources to reconcile the reluctant 
North. His zeal, perhaps, transcended 
the suggestions of personal and political 
expediency. Some of it was possibly 
due to the malignant violence and keen- 
ness with which his course had been 
hailed by Abolitionists and ultra Free- 
Soilers ; but those who knew Mr. Web- 
ster most intimately, bear witness that 
the principal motive of his course from 
first to last was an unwavering convic- 
tion that the duration of the Union and 
the sanctity of the Constitution de- 
pended upon entire acquiescence in 
those pacificatory conventions. The ef- 
fect upon the state of feeling at the 
North was perhaps fortunate for the 
country; but it cannot be doubted that 
a large number of personal friends and 



veteran supporters of the statesman were 
thenceforward obliged to temper their 

admiration with some portion of regret, 
ft was only a few weeks after Mr. 
Webster's accession to the Secretaryship 
of State, that the letter of Cheval'ei 
Hulsemann, in relation to an alleged in- 
terference of the American Government 
in the internal affairs of Austria, was 
addressed to the Department. This 
document, famous only for the response 
it provoked, contained a recital of com- 
plaints preferred by the Imperial Court, 
in consequence of Mr. Dudley Mann's 
mission of observation to Austria and 
Hungary, and the reports made by that 
agent, in which language disrespectful , 
to the Governments of Russia and Aus- 
tria was alleged to have been used ; 
and the Austrian Charge felt impelled 
to enter a protest against what his prin- 
cipals chose to regard as an act of im- 
pertinent intervention. The reply of 
Mr. Webster, which was withheld for 
some time, as if to aggravate the con- 
temptuous rejoinder by a preface of con- 
temptuous silence, is fresh in every 
recollection. Its lofty and dignified 
tone, a tone indeed of haughty conde- 
scension ; the faithful and unanswerable 
refutation it offered to some of Mr. 
Hulsemann's allegations, and the air 
with which controversy about others 
was declined ; the rebuke administered 
to the Austrian Government for its des- 
potic barbarity ; the bold and unmis- 
takable statement of the American 
policy toward a people ridding itself of 
such a yoke as that imposed upon the 
Hungarians; these traits, and the ani- 
mated eloquence with which they were 
framed, constitute the note to the Aus- 
trian Charge one of the finest papers in 
the archives of diplomacy. It will 
remain as a model for diplomatic contro- 
versy hereafter, where republican prae 
tice'is called in question, and republican 
frankness is demanded to justify it. It 
will be regarded as the authority upon 
all matters of external policy. And 
Boholars and general readers will recur 
to it as a pattern of literary elegance 
and intellectual brilliancy. 



50 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



In May, 1851, Mr. Webster, accom- 
panying the President and his colleagues 
in tii«- cabinet, visited tic- Btate of New 
York, on the occasion of celebrating the 
completion of the New York and Erie 
Railroad. <~>n reaching Dunkirk, he 
was detained there by the illness of his 
son, and compelled to separate from the 
party. At Buffalo lie was compli- 
mented by a public dinner, at which he 
made an extended and admirable sp 
mainly upon the rapid growth of that 
section of the State, with allusions to 
some of the hading topics that had re- 
cent 1 ged public attention. The 
next day, on the 22d, he addressed the 
people of Buffalo more directly upon 
the subjects which were then prominenl 
in the public mind, vindicating the 
policy of the Administration upon all 
points, and defending his own cours. i. 



relation to Central American at: 
Tehuantepec treaty ; the qu< - 
of the right of fishery; and that of the 
ownership of the Lobos Islands. As 
are contemporary matters, and 
opinions about them still variable, be- 
not founded upon the most ample 
supplies of information, and as their 
immation will now pass into ofh.-r 
hands, we do not think proper to admit 
them into our estimate of tli 
We know nothing of tl. 



man. 



that might have been given to an] 
them had the illustrious diplomatist 
survived. It is not worth while, with 
the lights before us, say anyl 
more than that the action of Mr. V 
ster was undoubtedly the result of en- 
tire devotion to what he believed to be 
the truest interests of the country. 
that whatever room there may be to 
He was greeted also by large public I question the sound: his conclu- 

gatherings of people at Rochester, Al- sions, there is no reason to impeach his 
banv, and other points along the route, sincerity and integrity. 
at all of which lie made addresses more 
or less extended. 

Y, rv soon after his return to Washing 



In tracing this outline of the biogra- 
phy of a man who fills in American his- 
tory a place equal in honor and dignity, 
ton, Mr. Webster's attention was called though differing in kind, with t 
to our relations with Spain, in conse- occupied by Pitt, Fox, and Burke, in 
quence of the expedition against Cuba, the history of England, we hai 
to which Gen. Lopez and a large number obliged i many of thos 

of American citizens fell victims. lib sions when be came into more imme* 
offices, less promptly rendered than an diate contact with the people. In 
impatient public sentiment demanded, the published collection of his w 
procured the release of a large number there are various orations, addri 
of prisoners who had been carried to and letters, which excited the highest 
Spain, and subsequently obtained the applause at the time <«f their publica- 
discharge of Mr. John B. Thrasher, tion, and remain as witnesses of the 



whose dubious citizenship evoked from 
the Secretary an able discussion of 



diversified qualities and resources of his 

mind. We might mention among 



the law of domicil. The rough treat- 1 these lib eulogistic tributes to Gen 
meiit of the Spanish consul at New Or- Jackson and Mr. Calhoun; his various 



Kan- by the populace, inflamed by the 
cruelties practised upon the soldiers of 
ih. expedition by the Spanish authori- 

of i luba, was likewise the Bubji 
correspondence and reparation. The 
last year of Mr. Webster's life was occu- 
pied with several diplomatic questions 
of the highesl importance, bnl which he 

was prevented from completing by the 
hand of .Lath. The-.' were the revival 



addresses to his friend-- in Boston and 
ibors at Marshfield ; hi- oration at 
Ne* 1 lamp-hire festival : his 
tal paper read last winter before the N 
York Historical Society, and published 
in the papers of the day ; his letters 
to Hon. Isaac Hill, an I to our mil 
at Constantinople, in relation to the 
release of the Hungarian rel N • 

one of these but illustral 



of the Clayton and Bulwer treaty in masculine, but exquisitely sculptured 



%ife of Daniel Webster. 



1 



feature of his Titanic intellect ; and 
forms one of the many links by which 
he attracted to himself, not only the 
popular admiration, but the admira'.ion, 
the esteem, the enthusiastic devotion of 
all educated men. 

It would however be unjust to his 
memory to pass unnoticed his opinions 



tli-' river, to the warm, upper air?" At 
the invitation of Congress, Kossuth 
visited Washington, and on the 7th of 
January, partook of a public banquet 
tendered to him by a large number of 
the members of both Houses. Mr. 
Webster was present on this occasion, 
and made a speech, in which, although 



and action in regard to the great event i restrained by the proprieties of his posi- 
by which in future time the current year | tion from making any allusion to the 
will be distinguished, — the visit of the ] sentiments or intended action of the 
Hungarian Kossuth to the United States. Government, he did not hesitate to de- 
Mr. Webster had early evinced the warm ' clare his entire sympathy with the at- 
interest which he felt in the welfare of j tempt of Hungary to achieve her inde- 
that noble martyr to the cause of Con-^pendence, and in his opinion that she 
stitutional liberty in Hungary, by^bis was entitled, by her population, by her 
letter of instructions to the Hon. George institutions, and by the valor of her peo- 
P. Marsh, our Minister at Constantinople, i pie, to an independent national existence, 
directing him to use all the influence of He also referred to the speech which he 
his official position to prevent his sur- made in the Senate of the United 
render to the Austrian Government, ' States, in 1824, upon the principles in- 
and to permit his retirement to the i volved in the Greek revolution ; and 
United States. Governor Kossuth reach- 1 declared that he adhered to them in 
ed New York on the 6th of December, ' every respect, and was quite ready to 
1851, and at once entered upon that apply them to whatever case might be 
great pilgrimage of romance, and of love presented. The citations we have made, 
to the crushed hopes and liberties of his in a previous portion of this biography, 
native land, which stands without from that speech, supersede the necessity 
parallel in the history of the world, of dwelling further upon the specific 
" For the first time," said the most elo- purport of this declaration. In letters 
quent American living, in speaking of written in reply to various invitations to 
his appeals to the pity of the people of ; attend public meetings upon the subject, 
this Republic, — " for the first time since he expressed similar views with equal 
the transcendent genius of Demosthenes ' emphasis, 
strove with the downward age of Greece ; 
— or since the Prophets of Israel an- 



nounced, — each tone of the hymn 
grander, sadder than before, — the suc- 
cessive footfalls of the approaching 



Mr. Webster achieved high distinc- 
tion in three apparently incompatible 
walks of life — walks that are incompa- 



Assyrian, beneath whose spear the Law | tible to all but men of superior genius. 



should cease and the vision be seen no 
more ; our ears, our hearts, have drunk 
the sweetest, most mournful, most awful 
of the tones which man may ever utter, 
or may ever hear, — the eloquence of an 
Expiring Nation. — When shall we be 
quite certain again, that the lyre of 
Orpheus did not kindle savage natures 
to a transient discourse of reason ; <lid 
not suspend the labors and charm the 
pains «'t' the damned; did not lay the 
guardian of the grave asleep, and bring 
back Eurydice from the *">gion beyond 



As a lawyer, he for very many 
years held the foremost rank. Sur- 
passed by many in legal learning, by 
some in logical power, and by s few in 
the eloquence of his appeals to the jury, 
in the combination of all these great 
faculties he stands unrivalled. As a 
Statesman, in the mosl comprehensive 
meaning of that Large word, no Ameri- 
can, except Alexander Hamilton, can 
maintain a comparison with him. Mr. 
Calhoun had a more acute and meta- 
physical mind ; Mr. Clay, with a more 



52 



Life of Daniel Webei* 



electric nature, had far greater 
in reading public sentiment and in gain- 
ing command of the springs of popular 
attachment ; and each of those great 
men held in more complete control the 
opinions and conduct of large masses of 
their countrymen. But in that targe, 
liberal comprehensiveness which saw all 
around and all through every subject — 
which studied and judged everything in 
all its relations, and in that high-toned, 
unbending, unronipromlsing dignity of 
thought, of language, and of manner, 
with which lie was always clotlx-d, and 
which gave infinite impressiveness 
everything lie did or said — neither of 
them, nor any other American, living or 
dead, was equal to him. His political 
career was marked by greater con- 
sistency of principle than that of most 
of his distinguished cotemporaries, and 
by quite as close adherence to a single 
system of measures as is compatible with 
Wisdom in a science which is, in fact, 
only a science of expedients. Upon the 
question of the Tariff, he changed his 
policy — but only to meet chances in the 
business relations and interests of the 
section of the country for which lu- 
acted. At a still later day, during the 
struggles of I860 for sectional suprema- 
cy, Mr. Webster held a different position 
from that which he occupied with so 
much distinction during the similar 
convulsions of 1833. But the principles 
which he maintained on both these 
tsions v.' ntially the same: it 

was onlv upon the practical measure.- in 
which they were to he embodied, that he 
had changed. And always — in all these 
cases and in all tie- acts of hi- life, in 
everything he ever did or said, from the 
earliest day >.f hi- public service down to 

the late-t syllable of hi- recorded thin — 

he livd, an'! moved, and had his being. 
under the domination of an ever-pn 
Love of country, which knew no change, 
and left no act or word of his life un- 
marked by its presence and u- power. 
A more thorough American never trod 
the coiiiin, nt than Daniel Webster. He 
loved hi- coiiutn ; he bowed before the 
wisdom and le ly patriotism of it- foun- 



uid its fathers; he reverenced the 
Constitution which gave it national 
being and position in the view of the 
world ; and he devoted all the energies 
of hi.- life to 1 igainst whatever 

threatened, from any quarter, to weaken 
its foundation- or impair its strength. 
lor this high service, rendered with 
such matchless power, and fruitful of 
influences which will make them- 
felt at every period of our future history, 
he merits and will receive the profound- 
est gratitude of every heart. 

Hut besides the reputation which he 
n as a lawyer and a state-man, 
ter achieved the highest rank 
as aNjiujcary man. His speeches, his 
letter-, bis orations — all the products ,,f 
his pen and the utterances of his tongue, 
will be studied and admired by future 
ages, not less for their consummate lite- 
rary merit, than for the qualities more 
directly connected with the special pur- 
poses for which tiny were prepared. In 
the early part of his life, during his col- 
lege days and for some years after, his 
style was • ugly vicious and bom- 
bastic, to i which no one familiar 
only with his later productions would 
believe possible. "-There have 1 n few- 
mon in this country, of equally labori- 
ous and studious habits with Mr. Web- 
ster, and lie devoted himself for bUi 
sive years, with an earnest and resolute 
fidelity, to the correction and perfection 

of his style. He was fastidious to a re- 
markable in his choice of words. 
in the shaping of his sentences, and e\ en 
in the punctuation and emphasis which 
should be given to them. And although 
during his later rears, as the effect 
I his rigid and relentless mental disci- 
pline, easy and graceful language had 
ie -o habitual with him as tOSeem 
devoid of all effort and study, lie n< 
lai'l aside this minute attention to his 

Btyle, or Buffered any point, however tri- 
fling, of critical accuracy, to '-cape his 
Dotice.«a»In8tanoea of hi- conscientious 
exactitude, especially in the reports of his 

.-] lies, have repeatedly fallen under 

the observation of the presenl writer.- A 
\eiy foolish endeavor has been made by 



Life of Daniel Web 



53 



some of Mr. Webster's friends, to create 
the impression that the great orations 
and speeches which have tarried his ce- 
lebrity all over the world, were made 
with little effort and trifling preparation. 
Even so judicious a writer as Mr. Eve- 
rett, seeks to confirm the statement of 
Mr. March, that the reply to Hayne was 
the result of at most a few hours' reflec- 
tion, and that all the notes he made for 
it were contained upon one side of a 
sheet of paper. This latter statement is 
true, so far as the notes from which he 
spoke are concerned ; but the general 
impression conveyed in these representa- 
tions is unjust to Mr. Webster, and cal- 
culated to induce very injurious theories 
and habits in the minds of the young. 
Mr. Webster had prepared himself for 
that debate with all his usual care. He 
knew a fortnight beforehand the points 
that would be made, the positions that 
would be assumed, and the parties that 
would be assailed. And we have no 
doubt that all those maguificent pas- 
sages which live in the memory and 
glow in the heart of all who read them, 
were prepared beforehand with the ut- 
most care and the nicest discrimination 
in the choice of words. And the same 
thing is certainly true of many other of 
his most celebrated speeches. 

But great as Mr. Webster was in all 
these high spheres of intellectual activity, 
no one who has ever had opportunities of 
judging will hesitate to say, that he was 
equally great in the more restricted de- 



partment of Conversation, He was an 

accomplished scholar, especially conver- 
sant witli the best portions of English 
literature, and more or less familiar with 
every subject which engages attention. 
In a circle of friends, at table, or even in 
a tete-a-tete with a single person, lus 
conversation was the richest and most 
instructive entertainment that can be 
conceived. He was sometimes a little 
too didactic to suit the ideal of a good 
converser ; but no hearer ever com- 
plained of this as a fault. He expressed 
himself always, upon every occasion, 
and in making the most trifling remark, 
with that clearness, accuracy, and 
weighty dignity, which were insepara- 
ble from his nature. We cannot imagine 
a richer contribution to the literature of 
America and the world than would be a re- 
cord of Mr. Webster's conventions upon 
topics of public concern. No such per- 
fect collection, of course, can ever be 
made. But those who were admitted 
to the high privilege of his intimate and 
confidential society, owe to the world 
some reminiscences of this great man, of 
whom the world can never know too 
much. For it is only thus that coming 
generations can receive that degree of 
instruction and advantage to which they 
have a claim, from Him who, in so em- 
phatic a sense, 

" TV us not for an Age, 
But for all Time." 



EDITORIAL REMARKS. 



The event which the whole country' 
has, for a few days, been anticipating 
with the deepest sorrow, has at length 
occurred. Daniel Webster is no longer 
of the living. He has paSBe^ from the 
scene of his vast labors and his glorious' 
triumphs, to join the great of all ages in 
the spirit-land. But lie has left a nation 
of mourners. His family, his relatives, 



the extended circle of his ardent p. rsonal 
friend-, have no monopoly of grief — but 
every American in whose breasl beat 
American heart partakes the general 

sorrow. \o man could have departed 
from us who would have left bo larg 

—whose place could not h 
more easily supplied. No name of the 
present day i< so intimately inter- 



54 



Life of Danul Webster. 



wrought into Lh&very web and woof of 
our cotmtry'a history — none, surety, to 
which ail American may point with a 
more beartfelt and glowing pride. The 
mourning which spreads over the land 
will know no north, no south, no east, 
no west. It will not be confined by nar- 
row limits; — State Knee cannot bound it 
— degrees of latitude or longitude will 
not check its flowing ; but over the broad 
bosom of this great Continent, from 
ocean to ocean — nay, wherever on the 
oceans float the stars and stripes, there 
will well up from noble hearts the pro- 
foundest lamentation tor the inestimable 
loss our country has sustained. Party 
animosities slink into their burrow — po- 
litical rivalries and jealousies are over- 
shadowed by the great bereavement, and 
hide away. The weapons of party war- 
fare fall harmless to the ground, and 
contending parties and rival sections give 
token of humanity, and swell the tide 
and volume of the common grief. 

It seems, indeed, n pity that such 
large experience, Buch commanding pow- 
ers, gathered and strengthened amid the 
troubles, contests, trials, and vicissitudes 
of the world, could not have been longer 
vouchsafed to us, a conspicuous light and 
guide to the present and coming genera- 
tions of men. But no endowments of 
heaven can guarantee an earthly exist- 
ence beyond the usual limits of life; 
nor, hoWever much mankind might gain, 
would it •!••• just to the individual, to 
withhold him from that higher Bphere 
that I kons and awaits him. Hut 

Webster's bright example and recorded 
wisdom remain. As In- passed over the 
disc of this life, he has enacted his part 

Oil so Conspicuous a field, that all have 
been able to profit by his oareer; and 

his majestic orations yet resound in • 

ear. It is fortunate indeed, that his fo- 

ic reputation will aol depend, as that 
of many great orators has done, mi 
on tradition. It will not die out of the 
memory of any succeeding generation. 

His own great thoughts, in bis own har- 
monious and stirring language, are 
stamped upon the living page, "and 

there they will remain I 



That Mr. Webster should, at this 
time, have surrendered bis lite, cannot be 
surprising, even to those who know how 
much of iron entered into his constitu- 
tion, when they reflect upon the extra- 
ordinary labors he has performed. What 
frame but his that would not have 
broken down under merely the pi 
sional duties that have been cast upon 
him. For nearly half a century, he has 
been " sought out," not only in his own, 
but in other countries and States, to sus- 
tain the chief weight and responsibility 
of the most important litigations. If 
mighty interests were at stake, or new 
and interesting questions involved, or 
if causes depended upon constitu- 
tional construction, the services were 
invoked of this Goliah of the North. 
When we remember a few of the most 
conspicuous of the causes in which he 
has been employed, — the Astor cases in 
this city— the Dartmouth college ease — 
the famous . steamboat case between New 
Jeisey and New York, of Gibbons 
Ogden — the Crowning&hields — the 
York Fir.- cast — the Girard will — the 
recent India rubber case— -when we turn 
over the decisions of the Federal Courts 
of the Union, and see how numerous and 
important are the questions upon w Inch 
he has been professionally called to shed 
the light of his mind — when we think 
how many hundreds ci nisi print causes 
he has tried, reports of which have I 
been embalmed in type— remec 
too, that in all v^i these cases it has 
his lot to try his strength with the ablest 
and most distinguished lawyers <•(' the 
Union, with men whos C powers might 
well arouse the highest effort of tran- 
scendent genius — with Jeremiah Mason, 
Samuel Dexter, and Joseph Story, with 
Pinckney, Emmett, Wirt, and with the 
most brilliant advocates of the preseul 
day, it may well awaken BUrprise that, 

under the pressure of such legal labors, 

he should have Stood up BO stoutly and 
BO long. But when we accumulate the 
other achievements >■•( his lite — his mis- 
cellaneous studies — his laborious re- 
searches into all partment 
of knowledge — his agricultural Bupervi- 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



55 



and care — his varied, continuous, 
voluminous correspondence — Ins 



sion 
and 

magnificent addresses upon literary and 
patriotic topics and occasions — his social 
duties, though pleasing, yel rendered im- 
nterous and exhausting by his high dis- 
tinction — bis long-continued and prodi- 
gious legislative labors in the councils 
of the Union, partaking in the discussion 
of the many exciting questions that have 
arrested or shaken the country — hi- bask 
so successfully performed as the head of 
the State Department — and the wear and 
tear of the constant excogitation of his 
stupendous intellect, we are impressed 
with astonishment, not only at the mind 
that could accomplish such gigantic la- 
bors, but at the corporeal frame, which, 
for seventy years, could sustain the work- 
ing of such huge enginery. Surely it 
was not of common materials, as it was 
not of common mould. It had the ele- 
ments of rare endurance, and unwonted 
power. But, at last, exhausted, it has 
released its hold upon the great soul that 
has so long inhabited and informed it. 
And yet, up to a very recent period, we 
could not speak of him as having grown 
old in his labors, for years left no ener- 
vating mark upon him, but only seemed 
to lay an accumulating wealth of dio-- 
nity and majesty upon thaf, historic 
head. 

In the short period of our national 
existence, our country lias been wonder- 
fully fruitful of great men. The stirring 
period of her revolutionary history was 
calculated to bring out and excite to ut- 
most tension, whatever of talent, power, 
and genius thw existed amongstA** 
sons. The succeeding stage of het^ea- 
reer was scarcely less adapted to call into 
requisition the utmost efforts of her chil- 
dren, in the ity the time imposed, 
of reducing chaos into order, and organ- 
izing. launching, and boldly carrying for- 
ward tliis new government; and intel- 
lectual capabilities could not lie idle, 
when such tempting fields of conquest 
stretched within the view of laudable 
ambition. And yet the eye may glance 
along the starry names that hang in the 
clear sky of our national history, and it 



will iind none of greater magnitude or 

brighter ray than that, which has just 
ascended to take its merited position in 
ile- constellated dome. 

In real intellectual strength, it is pro- 
bable that Web.-ter rarely had his equal 
since the morning of time. Certainly, 
at the time of his death, no man known 
to us, in any of the nations, evjnced a 
like capacity. Strength, mental sinew, 
was his crowning characteristic. The 
resistless power with which he trod the 
field of contest betokened inevitable over- 
throw to those who dared oppose him. 
When the chosen champion of the South, 
amidst the exultations of his friends, 
endeavored to bind and fetter the arms of 
Webster with the tough cords that had 
been so long fabricating and seasoning, 
the giant sat calm in repo,se, till his ene- 
mies rejoiced in the anticipated accom- 
plishment of their object ; then, slowly 
rising, as if sustaining the drooping hopes 
of the country, with the light of con- 
scious superiority beaming from his eye, 
he tore asunder the strands that bound 
him like wisps of straw, and applying 
his stalwart shoulders to the temple his 
adversaries had reared, whelmed the 
structure and architects in one common 
and undistinguishable ruin. No intel- 
lectual contest in this country had ever 
excit'd similar hopes and fears. The 
whole people had started to their feet at 
the eloquent and audacious assault that 
Col. Haynes had made upon him. 
Great and commanding as all knew his 
powers to be; confident as was the reli- 
ance of his friends in the exhaustless fer- 
tility of his genius, yet every one, hut 
himself, felt the tremor of fear that there 
was a possibility of failure, and that, in 
that time of awful responsibility, the 
lustre of his name might dim and die 
before the darting splendor of the South- 
ern star. But from the Hist moment 
that his clarion note resounded in the 
Senate, hope changed to confidence; 
then peal on peal of withering m 

hr-ke over the heads of h : s affrighted 
; he brushed their cobweb argu- 
3 from sight, planted tie' patriotism 
of the old J lay State on an immortal 



/ 



56 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



eminence, and closed with 'a strain of lie interest, and before popular ussem- 



deep and magnificent eloquence upon 
the bl e> the necessity, and the 

glory of the I'mu.n, that has no parallel 
in llie records of speech. What were 
his lensations during the delivery of this 
splendid oration, he has himself narrated, 
in answer to a friend "I felt," said he. 
" as if every thing I had ever seen, or 
read, or heard, was floating before me, 
in one grand panorama, and I had little 
else to do, than to reach up, and cull a 
thunderbolt, and hurl it at him I" 

In referring to a professional argu- 
ment, ma. it- by him only five or six 
months sine, we? said of him, and now 
repeat, that thirty years ago, when 



Webster was in the freshness of his V A prominent feature in Mr. \^ V, 

ambition, and the prime of his physical- Argumentation, was the extraordinary 

clearness, skill, and compactness of his 



?Si 



life, he must have been the most con- 
vincing, resistless, terrific advocate that 
ever stood before a jury. So many 
forces mingled in him — such a substra- 
turn of common Bense, the gnat primi- 
tive rock that Bapports all else — such 
comprehensiveness and sweep of glance 
— such imagination when he chose to 
ermit its intrusion amidst his sterner 
thoughts — such diction, every word a 
sledge-hammer — such capacity for strip- 
ping off all disguises in which ingenuity 
may have dressed its sophistries — such 
advantages of person, of presence, man- 
ner, eye, and voice, were perhaps never 
united, in equal proportions, in any 
individual before. The arguments of 
his opponents were brittle in his ban. Is. 
What Gordian knots he could not wait 
to untie, he rent in twain. Before tin 
tribunal — a jury — to our mind unquea 
tionably, though this may not accord 
with tie- view, Webster stood in 

the position of all others, best adapted 
to display bis resources and his strength. 
Some suppose that the S< Date furnished 
the brightest Bcene for bis intellectual 
gladiatorship. Many think, from the 
I al character of hi- mind, thai 
severe and close ratiocination before the 
Supreme Court of the United State-. 
was the element in which he found 
himself most at home. And some 
imagine, that on great occasions of pub- 



blies, where he might • from the 

unyielding bands of logic, and follow 
his inclination amid chosen topics, and 
indulge the lead of his powerful imagi- 
nation, he rose above the standard of 
his usual accomplishment. Bit, in our 

inelit, there Ii.\er wa- a place 
where he has b<-en so thoroughly 
aroused, where he has come so near his 
possibility of effort, as wheu, standing 
before twelve jurors, in an individual 
case that touched hi> sympathies, and 
fired by the immediate antagonism of 
able adversaries, he has put forth his 
energies to defend some hunted right, or 
pursue some grievous wrong. 



statement. His forma] statement of a 
. was, itself, a demonstration. A 
few simple sentences seemed to raise 
the question above the realm of doubt, 
and place it beyond assault ; and his 
subsequent argument hedged it around 
with impregnable defen< •***"'* 

\/\.nother admirable quality was his 
rare power of condensation. While 

other nun sought tojexpaiid, he labored 

to condense. The material be used was 
not beaten into leaf, but crowded into 
bars and ingots. A graphic sentence 
oft contained the whole question and 
its solution. He aimed no scattering 
fowling-piece, that threw its innocent 

shot around the subject to be hit. but 
planted his rifle-bullet in the very centre 

of . 

o man could ittM' or read the 

dies of Webster without being 

tiluck with the rich philosophy that 

was continually enfolding his subject. 

Themes that other men looked \\y to 

at. he Btooped to touch, and when 

he touched them, lifted them into the 

sphere he occupied, enveloped them 
with the affluence of hi- own intellect, 
-:ed them with classical allusion 
and golden bi them 

greater dignity, and higher views, and 
linked them to broader associations. 
Mr. Webeter'a person wore the siguifi 




Life of Daniel II'. 



57 



cance of his grandeur : it was a tone- 
ment worthy of the tenant. His ample 
proportions, brawny but graceful ; his 
imposing form, his dignified manner, 
his imperial port, his solemn gaze, his 
majestic and towering head — the vision 
and faculty divine that looked out of 
those comprehensive, spiritual orbs, the 
intellectuality that sat enthroned upon 
his massive brow, impressed the beholder 
with unwonted awe. Most great men 
fall so far short of the ideal that is 
formed of them, that they dwindle and 
dwarf upon approach. Distance of 
time or space lends its enchantment to 
the view, and through its magnifying 
mists those gods of our idolatry loom 
up into Titanic stature. But to this 
rule, Mr. Webster was an exception, 
almost the sole exception. We doubt, 
if ever the man came into his presence, 
who did not leave with enhanced con- 
ceptions of his native majesty and 
power. Nature had set her seal of great- 
ness upon him, and the common voice 
of his countrymen, in calling him " the 
Godlike," testified that that seal was not 
illegible to them. 

He found the solace of his pastime 
hours, in the resonant voices of the 
waves that Ocean dashed along the 

# O 

beach which margined his country home 
— in superintending agricultural uses — 
in walking, driving, fishing, and in the 
genial converse of family and troops of 
friends. He rose at the hour of three 
or four, and, in study and labor, awaited 
the announcement of auroral dawn. 
The quiet and beautiful morning hours 
imparted to him strength and know- 
ledge, and garlanded with freshness his 
momentous lite. 

Mr. Webster must have left materials 
for biography of uncommon extent and 
opulence. The six volumes of his 
speeches which have just appeared, may 
be immeasurably extended. His manu- 
scripts must disclose a vast variety and 
range of interesting composition. His 
diaries and correspondence would be 
seized by the public with avidity, while 
his conversation, and the countless an- 
ecdotes concerning him, that rest in 



the memories of individuals, would give 
intense zest to his biography. We 

should hope that every one who had 
any anecdote or interesting conversation 
of his to relate — and who has not, that 
has ever spent a half hour in his pre- 
sence — would commit the sain.' to per- 
manent form, and transmit it to some 
common destination, where it might 
await the pen of the biographer. His 
speeches have done much to educate the 
present generation of active m< n. In 
country schools, academies, and colleen 
his sonorous sentences have formed the 
staple of declamation. He has thus 
poured his lofty sentiments into the 
minds of our youth, and every educated 
man of the country must this day feel 
that he is under obligations he can never 
repay, to the inspirations of Daniel 
Webster. Let us now have his life, and 
all the productions of his pen, and such 
of the utterances of his tongue as may 
be caught and gathered, that they may 
all float down the stream of time, a 
blessing and delight to all ages — coex- 
istent with literature and liberty. Such 
names and such productions make the 
garniture of History. 

In the sadness of this occasion, how 
naturally, yet how sorrowfully, does the 
mind turn towards that splendid trium- 
virate of statesmen, — Clay, Calhoun, and 
Webster, but recently the pride and 
glory of the land, now enacting another 
stage of their destiny in the world be- 
yond the stars. For forty years they 
had mingled their efforts and voices in 
the councils of the Union. Upon all 
great questions of public policy, each 
has left his indelible mark. Each, as we 
have stated heretofore, in himself a host, 
— with physical and intellectual powers 
so different, yet so surpassing— -though 
not always agreeing, indeed Bometim< 
at angry variance — a war among the 
gods — yel always inseparably associated 
— marching side by side through many 
years of pith and moment in the history 
of America and the world — preeminent 
in powers of thought, and in the 
mode of expressing thought ; we see 
them now, with the eye of memory, in 



58 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



tlj.-it more than Amphictyonic assem- 
blage— Clay, with his electric fire, and 

burning and impassioned eloquence— 
Calhoun, clear, terse, logical, metaphysi- 
cal, with the skill of Tell, shooting an 
apple from the head, — and Webster, 
calm, grand, majestic, sitting on the 
loftiest peaks of Olympus, darting 



lightnings, and rolling thunders. But 
now, alas ! those eloquent voices are 
tiushed ; those great hearts have cc 
their beating ; their continuous guid- 
ance has been withdrawn from us ; — and 
the American people, in sorrow and 
orphanage, lament their loss. 



DEATHBED SCENES. 



The situation of Mr. "Webster became 
dangerous on Thursday the 21st of Oc- 
tober, and but faint hopes of his recovery 
were even then entertained. He con- 
tinued to sink very rapidly until Sunday 
morning, the 24th; when, at 2 o'clock 
and 38 minutes, he expired peacefully 
and happily. 

The following particulars of Mr. Web- 
ster's last momenta are gathered from 
the telegraphic despatches which were 
forwarded during the progress of the ma- 
lady, and from other Bources : 

During all the time when Mr. Web- 
ster was free from pain, he conversed 
cheerfully with the friends around his 
bedside, and more than once playfully 

proached his faithful nurse, Sarah, for 
not retiring to bed. 

On Friday afternoon, he had the peo- 
ple employed in his family and upon 
bis form called in, and after givingthem 
much earnest advice upon matters tem- 
poral and spiritual hade them a last 
farewell. 

On Saturday afternoon. Mr. Wehster 

•was again Beized with violent nausea, 
and raised considerable dark matter 
tinged with bl 1. Exhaustion now in- 
creased rapidly, and his physicians held 
another consultation, which resulted in a 

conclusion that his last lour was fa>t 

approaching. 

Be i. ceived the announcement, and 
requested that the female membi 
hi- family raighl be called in, via. : Mrs. 
Webster, Mrs. Fletcher Webster, Mrs, J. 



W. Paige, and Miss Downs, of New 
York. To each, calling them indivi- 
dually by name, he addressed a few 
words of farewell and religious consola- 
tion. 

Next he had called in the male mem- 
bers of his family, and the personal 
friends who were present at Marshfield, 
viz. : Fletcher Webster, (his only sur- 
viving son,) Samuel A. Appleton, (his 
son-in-law.) .1. W. Paige, Geo. T. Curtis, 
Edward Curtis, of New York, 1 
Harvey and Charles Henry Thomas, of 
Marshfield, and Messrs. Geo. J. Abbott 
and W. C. Zantzinger, both of the State 
Department at Washington. Add 
ing each by name, he referred to his 
past relations with them respectively, 
and one by one b'ade them an affec- 
tionate farewell. This was about half- 
past 6 P. M. 

Be do* had Mr. Peter Barvey called 
in again, and said to him : " Barvej . I 
am not bo sick but that 1 know you — 1 
am well enough u> know you; 1 am 
well enough to love you, and well 
enough to call down the richest of 
Heaven's blessings upon you and youis. 
Barvey, don't leave me till I am dead — 
don*t jeave Marshfield till I am a dead 
man." Then, as if speaking to him 
be sai.l : " I »u the 24th of < kitober, all 
that is mortal of Daniel Webster will he 
qo more." 

Be DOW prayed in his natural, usual 

—strong, full, and dear—ending 

with, "Heavenly Father, forgive my 



Life of Daniel Webtt&t. 



59 



sins, and receive me to Thyself, through 
Christ Jesus." 

At half-past seven o'clock, Dr. J. M. 
Warren arrived from Boston, to relieve 
Dr. Jeffries, as the immediate medical 
attendant. 

Shortly after he conversed with Dr. 
Jeffries, who said he could do nothing 
more for him than to administer occa- 
sionally a sedative potion. " Then," 
said Mr. Webster, "I am to be here 
patiently till the end : if it be so, may it 
come soon." 

At ten o'clock he was still lower, but 
perfectly conscious of everything that 
passed within his sight or hearing. 

Doctors Jeffries and Porter have in- 
timated an opinion that the immediate 
cause of the disease was a cancerous 
affection of some of the smaller intes- 
tines. 

The closing scenes are well portrayed 
by the Boston Courier : 

The last hours of one so beloved as 
he whose -earthly career has just closed, 
amid so many circumstances of consola- 
tion, were of the same even tenor as all 
the rest. The public are already in- 
formed of the chief features of that 
deeply interesting scene up to the period 
when Mr. Webster desired to take leave 
of all who were in the house. One by 
one, in deep sorrow, but sustained by 
his own great example, the members of 
his family, and the friends and attend- 
ants, came in and took leave of him. 
He desired them to remain near his 
room, and more than once enjoined on 
those present who were not of his im- 
mediate family, not to leave Marahfield 
till his death had taken place. Re- 
assured by all that his every wish would 
be religiously regarded, he then ad- 
dressed himself to his physicians, making 
minute inquiries as to his own condition, 
and the probable termination of his life. 
Conversing with great exactness, he 
seemed to be anxious to be able to mark 
to himself the final period of his dissolu- 
tion, lie was answered that it ini 
occur in one, two, or three hours, but 
that the time could not Ik- definitely 
calculated. " Then," said Mr. Webster, 



" I suppose I must lie here quietly till it 
coni' The retching and vomiting 

now recurred again. Dr. Jeffries offered 

to Mr. Webster something which he 
hoped might give him ease "Some- 
thing more, doctor — more — I want re- 
storation." 

Between 10 and 11 o'clock, he re- 
peated somewhat indistinctly the words, 
"Poet, poetry, Gray, Gray." Mr. 
Fletcher Webster repeated the first line 
of the Elegy. " The curfew tolls the 
knell of parting day." " That's it, that's 
it," said Mr. W., and the book was 
brought and some stanzas read, which 
seemed to give him much pleasure. 

From 12 till 2, there was much rest- 
lessness, but not much suffering. The 
physicians were quite confident that 
there was no actual pain. A faintness 
occurred, which led him to think that 
his death was at hand. While in this 
condition, some expressions fell from him 
indicating the hope that his mind would 
remain to him completely until the last. 
He spoke of the difficulty of the pro- 
cess of dying, when Dr. Jeffries repeated 
the verse : 

" Though I walk through the valley 
of the Shadow of Death, I will fear no 
evil ; for thou art with me, — thy rod and 
thy staff, they comfort me." 

Mr. Webster said immediately : 

" The fact, the fact. That is what I 
want — thy rod, thy rod — thy .stall", thy 
staff" 

The close was perfectly tranquil and 
easy, and occurred at precisely 22 mi- 
nutes before 3 o'clock. The persons 
present were: Mr. and Mrs. Fletcher 
Webster, Mr. and Mrs. Paige, Mr. 8. A. 
Appleton, Miss Downes, Mr. Leroy, 
Edward Curtis, Peter Harvey, George 
T. Curtis, Charles Henry Thomas, Esq., 
George J. Abbott and W. C. Zantzin- 
ger, of the State Department, Dra, 
Jeffries and .1. Mason Warren, and the 
personal attendants ami domestics of 
Mr. Webster. Mrs. Webster, being un- 
able to witness the last moments, awaited 
the event in her own apartment. 

In accordance with the expressed wish 
of Mr. Webster, the arrangements for 



60 



Life of Daniel H 



the funeral were made without ost 
tiou. The remains were deposited in 
the family tomb at Marshfield. The 
President indicated a wish to attend the 
funeral, in company with the members 
of the Cabinet ; but was subsequently 
obliged to remain at Washington, in 



consequence of the pressure of Executive 
duties. ' Gen. Franklin Pierce early ap- 
prised the family of Mr. Wei -•• r of his 
irish and intention to pay a last tribute 
of respect to the memory of the Great 
Statesman. 



THE VOICE OF THE PRESS. 



From the Boston Courier. 

Daniel "Webster is no more ! The 
arm that defended the constitution is 
broken in death. The sun that fa 

guided the steps of the nation is 
quenched. That great intellect which 
poured forth its treasures of truth and 
wisdom for the enlightenment of man- 
kind has departed from among us. The 
lips whose words were miracles, and 
which stirred the nation like the sound 
of a trumpet, are forever closed — forever 
silent. The great heart that embraced a 

whole people DO longer throbs with the 
flood of lit'.-. All that was mortal of 
Daniel Webster has returned to dust, 
but his spirit ivmains among us; his 
fame can never die ; nor the light of his 
great example — nor the lessons of wis- 
dom he has taught us. Men die — prin-. 
eipl'-s never. 

Twenty-six yean ago Mr. Webster 
spoke in Faneuil Hall the following 
woi.U. on the Bubject of the death of 
Adams and Jefferson. We quote them 
no less for the truth of the sentiment 
they contain than for their striking ap- 
propriateness to the present occasion, 
speaker could nol have drawn a 
more faithful picture of himself than he 
has done in these lines : 

rperior and commanding human 
intelligence, a trul) greal man. when 
heaven vouches bo rare a gift, is nol a 
temporary Bame burning Bright for a 
while, and then expiring, giving place to 
returning darkness. It is rather a spark 

of fervent le at, a- well as radiant light, 

with power to enkindle the common 



of human mind, so that when it 
glimmers in its own decay, and finally 
goes out in death, no night follows, but 
it leaves the world all light all on fire, 
from the potent contact of its own 
spirit.'' 

Vain and superfluous would be the 
effort at the present moment to call to 
our aid the boat of commonplace epi- 
thets and rhetorical phrases that are 
usually bestowed upon the subject of a 
eulogy. Everyone feels that the nation 
has lost its greatest man. its truest friend 
— its wisest counsellor — its most coura- 
geous champion — its best patriot The 
national heart will be transfixed with 
unspeakable sorrow at the sad and 
solemn cadence of the words — Daniel 
Webster is no more I 

< >ur country has lost many gifted 
spirits — many strong intellects, many 
brave and devoted hearts; but since the 
day when George Washington was sum- 
moned from earth, we have not been 

called tO mOUTD the loBS Of . ruly 

great, bo clearly destined to stamp his 
name and character upon the 
Mr. Webster. II.' taught the American 
people not only to be great and power- 
ful, but he taught them justice and 
honor, he taught them steadfast princi- 

and manly Belf-n - 
patriotism, comprehensive and true phi- 
lanthropy. His teachings were for all 
time. A future age will render him the 
justice which was withheld from him in 
this. 

The great statesman was great to the 

last. The light of that splendid intel- 



Life of Daniel Webster, 



61 



lect went out at full blaze. The strong 
sense, the clear thought, the firm self- 
ppssession, that have ever been the men 
tal characteristics of Daniel Webster, re- 
mained with him to the hour of his 
death. He died at his post, with the 
cares of a nation on his hands, yet in 
full preparation for his great and last 
change. With a noble calmness of spirit 
he contemplated the sublime and solemn 
approach of the King of Terrors, and 
he passed into the bosom of eternity sus- 
tained by all the hopes and confidence 
of a sincere Christian. 



From the Boston Post. 

It will require the office of time, the 
great reconciler, ere it can be fully real- 
ized that Daniel Webster, the peerless 
orator of world-wide forensic and Sena- 
torial renown, is no more. But yester- 
day he returned to the constituency 
which had so faithfully stood by him ; 
he received an ovation such as is com- 
monly only awarded to conquerors ; and 
then he retired to his peaceful country 
abode, and prepared to resign his spirit 
into the hands of his Maker. And 
there, in the midst of the rural scenes 
he loved so well, by the ocean shore 
whose grandeur was a fit minister to his 
mighty intellect, his majestic form now 
lies cold and motionless in death ! 
Calm, trusting, sublime, was the closing 
scene of that great life. Even after the 
prostration of the physical frame was 
complete, the mind asserted its controll- 
ing power ; and in discourse of child- 
like simplicity, and yet of the brilliancy 
of former days, he, in united Roman 
and Christian dignity, wrapt about him 
his dying robe, and gently went to 
slumber with the dead. And so that 
man among men, that voice which could 
speak as no other voice could, will be 
seen and heard no more for ever. 

Most of the countrymen of Daniel 
Webster, so great has been the pride 
felt in his fame, have been for year- 
unwilling to admit that he belonged 
exclusively to party, lie had, even* in 



hi- lifetime, become historical* That 

colossal reputation) the result of so 

much culture and experiei was the 

product of American institutions; for, 

physically, tin- unequalled mountain 
scenery of hi- birth-State': and, morally, 
the great political ideas which his coun- 
try first practically graspe.l, hail to do 
with its development and maturity; 
and these no party can justly lay hold 
<>f, and claim as its own. Such in- 
fluences must be taken into account by 
those who would portray this reputation 
— would analyse its element-, describe 
its growth, and present the combination 
that stands out in such acknowledged 
grandeur; and it is worthy of remark, 
that the monument which Daniel Web- 
ster has left to perpetuate his renown, 
to account to God and man for the use 
he made of his unrivalled gifts, was 
^tiade by meditations on our country, on 
its material interests, on its intellectual 
progress, on its constitutional politv, 
and its manifest destiny. He asked no 
higher theme for discourse, and consi- 
dered none more worthy to be illustrated 
by his wonderful stores of ancient and 
modern lore. He drew inspiration from 
its history, which he studied with won- 
derful minuteness, and for which he had 
the love, it may almost be said the 
worship, of a great patriot. All this 
appears in his collected eloquence. This 
is not dead ; it caunot die. Its office is 
still to enkindle the human intellect. 
< feneration after generation will study 
it, and grow upon it. And in this 
monument of imperishable material, 
Paniel Webster still lives and speaks, 
and will continue to live and speak to 
distant ages in all his greatness, and to 
justify the respect and admiration which 
his countrymen felt toward him. 



From the New York Evening Post. 

As an academical orator, as a lawyer. 
as a diplomatist, and itesman,Mr. 

Webster achieved a fame, which sepa- 
rately, almost any of his contemporaries, 
living or dead, might have envied. Hi- 



69 



Life of Daniel Webster. 



anniversary addresses are almost tin? 
only specimens of that species of ora- 
in this country that will survive 
their author-;. His efforts at the bar, 
like most achievements in that arena, 
however memorable, will only poss> — i 
traditional fame, which in this country ifl 
never lasting. 

The Seriate has been his great theatre, 
where if he did not lay the foundations 
of his fame as an orator, h&- certainly 
erected the monuments which are to per- 
petuate it. His forensic oratory has 
rarely been surpassed either in ancient 
or modern times, and there is no doubt 
that his example in that body did more 
than is now easily appreciated, in ele- 
vating its stain Ian 1 of parliamentary elo- 
quence and decorum. 

He never betrayed the politician in 
the tone or the language of his speeches ; 
whatever might be the secret motives oi 
his heart, he always rested his policy 
upon professedly public grounds, and 
discussed them from a national, and 
never from a personal ora partisan point 
of view. In this respect, Mr. Webster's 
political speeches Btand in admirable con- 
trast with the style of parliamentary 
oratory which ordinarily prevails at 
Washington, and we cannot but think 
that the loss of his admirable example, 
in this respect, lias been sensibly felt by 
the Senate since he ceased actively to 
participate in the deliberations of that 
body. 

Sis life has left few lessons of greater 

value than may be gathered from the 

elevated tone of his Congressional 

S] lies, in which he never made one 

undignified appeal, or indulged in one 
personal or unparliamentary allusion. 
We do Dot recollect an instance of Mr. 
Webster's being called to order, or of his 
being out of ord< r, during the whole of 
his parliamentary life. This can hardly 
aid of any other person who < \ at 
held a seat in th< i as of the l Fnited 

States more than a single term. 

\s a Mate-man and as a diplomatist, 

Mr. Webster w ill continue to b 
mate,) variously, as he always has been, 
bv his countrymen. His greatn< 



capacities has been more frequent- 
ly qw :. especially by political ad- 
versaries, than as an orator or a lawyer. 



From the Boston Atlas. 

With him as with other great men> 
his public life was but a small part of 
his real existence. In private social life 
he shone as conspicuously as he did in 
public life, and no man can fully appre- 
ciate his grand pre-eminence, who has 
not enjoy,.,! the favor of his private 
friendship. 

When Mr. Webster entered public 
life, he found among his associates, Clay, 
Calhoun, and Forsyth, in the first rank 
of talent, lie has survived them all. 
He has followed them in the path of 
fame. Clay. I Jalhoun, and Forsyth pre- 

1 him in the Cabinet hike him- 
self, they were successively Secretaries of 
State, an office requiring the most ex- 
alted talents to perform well its duties. 
Like him, neither of them reached the 
Presidential chair, and in this is deve- 
loped a curious philosophical fact, con- 
nected with our popular institutions. 
His illustrious associates have gi ne down 
to the gravel He was left alone, the 
last of the glorious throng. South Caro- 
lina and Georgia hold the ashes of their 
illustrious sons, Calhoun and Forsyth; 
and amid the beautiful ami fertile glades 
of the dark and bloody ground, slumber 
in the sleep <<\' death the ashes of his 
greatest compear and associate, the ora- 

•' the feelings and ot' the heart, the 
statesman, the patriot, and the public 
idol, Henry Clay. There the soft bra 
chant his requiem, as they fan the leafy 

branches of the oak and the sycamore, 
in his far off Western home, in Uie 
secluded vale of Ashland. At Marsh- 
field, in the far Fast, within Bighl of the 
mighty ocean, upon which be loved bo 
well to look, and to draw great thoughts 
from its \a-t expanse, tumultuous and 
ever heaving with the current and the 
storm, rest the lifeless remains of the 
great New-England orator and bI 
man. There he lived for many years — 



Life of Dan'ul Webster. 



63 



his mansion the home of a generous hos- 
pitality. There he died in the fulness 
of years, and amid friends whom be 
loved, and there will be be buried. The 
deep, solemn roar of the ocean billow 
will roar on, like nature's cathedral 
music, until time shall be no more, 
as it has since the morning stars first 
sans toe-ether : but it will fall in silence 
Upon the ear of the mighty dead, sounds 
which when living he loved so well to 
hear. 

That man is a superficial observer of 
life, and a still more superficial reader of 
history and of human events, if from the 
seed of the tomb of the illustrious dead 
he can discover no flower which is to 
spring forth and blossom, and to throw 
its sweetness on the future glory of our 
land. The memory of the good, in the 
humblest walks of life, is among the 
choicest blessings which a wise Pro- 
vidence vouchsafes to mould the character 
and subdue the evil passions of our race. 
Tn the death of a great statesman, one 
who has deserved well of his country, 
who has passed his long and valued life 
in her service, whose deeds are among 
her richest treasure, around whose words 



in a manner more consolatory to his 

i . u-est friends. 

Of Mr. Webster's ability, character, 
and services it is not necessary to speak 
in detail. They are known and recog- 
nized everywhere, though perhaps never 
yet appreciated to the full -extent of 
their merits. They will be understood 
and valued most now that they are 
no longer available. Strongly attached 
to Whig principles, and thrqughout a 
long period sharing with Mr. Clay the 
leadership of the Whig party, he was at 
all times the patriot rather than the par- 
tisan. His most brilliant and impres- 
sive efforts of oratory are associated 
with recollections of national peril or 
national triumph ; and the strength of 
his sagacious mind never manife 
itself so conspicuously as when grap- 
pling with exigencies involving national 
rights or imperilling national dignity. 
The records of the Union present im- 
perishable evidence of his uudeviating 
devotion to its glory, and the surpassing 
energy and wisdom of his efforts in its 
behalf. 

Mr. Webster's fame is not circum- 
scribed within the limits of this Repub- 
are entwined the high resolve and the I lie, broad as they are. As a diplomatist, 
patriot truth, the ligaments which bind he is indissolubly connected with the 



a nation together shoot forth like the 
rooty fibres of a spear of grain or a 
young oak, after the kernel and the 
acorn have decayed and mingled with 
their mother earth. 



From the Washington Republic. 

Mr. Webster breathed his last in the 
bosom of his family, and with a soul > Our duty now is" while grieving over 



narrative of his last moments shows that 
'to him at least Death had lost all its 
terrors. He regarded its advance with- 
out apprehension, and resigned himself 
to its decree with the cheerful compo- 
sure of the Christian. His life could 



foreign life of the nation. His labors 
in that rpgard have perhaps contributed 
more than those of any man since 
Washington to give weight to the name 
of American in the councils of other 
countries. Cautious, yet full of cou- 
rage — fond of peace, yet fonder still of 
liberty and right— his diplomatic action 
displayed a genius and a power that 
have been felt throughout Europe, and 
have created a new era in the historic 
being of bis country. 



unclouded and serene. The telegraphic^ the bereavement, to profit by the exam- 
ple. We may do longer have the benefit 
of Mr. Webster's >kill to pilot the coun- 
try through a Bea of difficulties; but 
the patriotic spirit which nerved him in 



every hour of trial remains to us an 
heritage which neither I v-aih uor Time 



not have terminated more worthily, or I can weaken or destroy. 



/ 



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